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(c) Pakistan Herald Publications (Pvt.) Ltd., Pakistan - 1995

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951006
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Six killed in city violence
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 5: Six people were shot dead in the city on Thursday.
Four of them were gunned down in separate incidents, on suspicion of
being police informers, police said.
The bullet-riddled bodies of Mohammad Aslam, 24, and Mohammad Ismail,
26, were found in Orangi.
According to police, four unidentified young men riding a Suzuki-carry
arrived at their residence, knocked at the door and called them out
for a personal matter.
Later the young men forced them into the vehicle and fled. On
Thursday, their bodies, placed on a push-cart were found.
Their bodies were taken to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for autopsy.
A father and a son were found dead in the Sharafi Goth area. The
victims were identified as Abdul Aziz, 60, and his son Imran, 30. They
were alleged to be police informers, the police said.
The unidentified persons had kidnapped them outside their house on
Wednesday, drilled holes with an electric machine into their bodies,
besides using other method of torture on them.
The father who had looked for his son kidnapped at 1 pm, throughout
the day, was sitting outside his house when the same gang pounced on
him at 6 pm and took him to their hideout.
On a tip-off, the family of victims went to Gulistan Masjid in Korangi
to collect their bodies, but they found nothing except congealed blood
and hairs.
On Thursday, their bodies were found in Sharafi Goth. Notes, from
someone Lushpash, were found on them stating the result of spying.
Mohammad Afzal, 25, was shot dead in Korangi.
Unidentified men shot and injured Mohammad Mumtaz, said to be an MQM
Haqiqi worker, in Federal B Area.
Darogha Makhdoom Ahmad, 58, was standing outside his house in New
Karachi when unidentified persons gunned him down and fled. He was hit
in the head and taken to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital where he was
pronounced dead.
Another man, Mumtaz, was wounded in a shooting incident in Jauharabad.
951007
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Five killed in city violence
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 6: Five people were killed and five wounded in city
violence on Friday.
As a result of day-long intermittent shooting, two persons were killed
in Khudadad colony. They were identified as Imran alias Rajoo, and
Irfan Ahmad.
According to a housewife, some unidentified persons attacked the house
of Mansoor, and wounded his younger brother Khushnood, who was
admitted to the Aga Khan Hospital.
Jamila, who was caught in the crossfire, was also wounded and admitted
to the JPMC.
The violence was a sequel to the shooting on Thursday in which Sharif,
a bodyguard of Masroor, was killed.
Two suspects were gunned down in an encounter with police in Korangi.
They were identified by police as Lal Bashir, 25; and Mohammad Ayub,
26.
Police claimed that two suspected terrorists, riding a motorcycle,
came across a patrolling party near Ali Imambargaha in the area.
When the suspects saw police they abandoned their motorcycle and tried
to flee into nearby streets. The policemen chased them and in a
shootout that followed the suspects were killed. A Kalashnikov and a
TT pistol with several rounds were seized. The motorcycle had earlier
been stolen from the Korangi area.
The body of an 18-year-old boy, with bullet holes, was found in Khwaja
Ajmer Nagri. It was shifted to Abbasi Shaheen Hospital for autopsy.
Three people, including Shahnaz, Aamar and Babu, were wounded in
shooting in Mominabad and Gulzar-i-Hijri.
951009
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Four gunned down in violence
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Staff Report
KARACHI, Oct. 8: Four people were shot dead and four others wounded in
the city on Sunday.
The CIA Garden seized eight rockets and four shells in raids conducted
in Sharifabad and Orangi Town on Saturday night. It also arrested 11
people involved in the heinous crime, but did not disclose their
names.
Moreover, the law enforcement agencies had laid a siege to the Lines
Area, made house-to-house search and rounded up hundreds of suspects
for interrogation, witnesses said. Syed Mohammad Tahir was found dead
with his hands tied and bullet holes in his ear under a bridge. He was
a former policeman, but the area police did not confirm.
Zakir Shah, 32, was gunned down in an encounter with police in Baldia
Town, police said. The Baldia Town police said they were informed by
the 134, an emergency cell located in the chief ministers house, that
an outlaw was hiding in Kohati Mohallah. A shoot-out followed when
Zakir Shah fired upon the police. He was killed after being hit by a
bullet, police said.
The MQM and the Haqiqi in separate statements blamed each other for
paving way for the siege-and-search operation in the Lines Area.
The MQM alleged intra-factional fighting within the Haqiqi had led the
law enforcers to humiliate Mohajirs in the name of operation in the
area. The MQM claimed the law enforcers had arrested more than 1,000
people in the shanty settlements of Lines Area. While the Haqiqi
alleged the law enforcers had arrested more than 2,000 people in the
area.
The Haqiqi alleged the operation was aimed at crushing the party,
which is struggling for the rights of Mohajirs through peaceful
means. It held extortionists, minions of security agencies and the
narcotic peddlers responsible for the siege.
The police denied the arrest of a single person during the siege.
951010
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PPP man among six shot dead in violence
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 9 : Six people, including a PPP leader, were shot dead
and four others wounded in city violence on Monday.
Ghulam Qadir, a former general secretary of the PPP, and a his
colleague, Mohammad Iqbal, were gunned down after being kidnapped in
Orangi Town.
According to reports, after meeting a detained friend in Karachi jail,
they were going home when two armed men halted their Suzuki pick-up
and took them away at gunpoint. Their two companions, however, managed
to escape. Later, the bodies of Qadir and Iqbal, with bullet holes,
were found near Orangi Town.
Orangi police said their Suzuki had come under fire near Noorani
Masjid and, as a result, the two were killed and one was injured.
A motor mechanic was killed and a policeman was wounded in a sudden
attack by unidentified people in Korangi.
The van of a police petrol party of Zaman Town police station had
developed a mechanical fault. The policemen dragged the van to a
private workshop in Korangi 2 1/2.
As the mechanic, Mohammad Saleem, was repairing the van, a gang of
unidentified youths sprayed it with bullets. Saleem died on the spot
and a constable, Asghar, was wounded.
A constable, sitting in a hotel, was shot dead in Baldia Town.
According to police, Jaza Hussain, posted at the Baldia Town police
station, was taking tea when unidentified people fired upon him and
fled.
The body of a young man was found in a lane in Nazimabad. Police
identified him as Shakeel Ahmad, who had been gunned down after being
kidnapped.
Shakeel, 30, who was wounded by snipers in Liaquatabad on Oct 4,
succumbed to his injuries on Monday.
Four people were wounded in shooting: constable Asghar in Korangi,
Mudassar Habib in Model Colony, Jawad in New Karachi and an
unidentified man in Orangi.
951011
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Four MQM men shot dead in custody
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Staff Report
KARACHI, Oct. 10: Fahim Farooqi alias Commando, an MQM activist, and
a CIA official were murdered on Tuesday when unidentified men opened
fire on them in Nazimabad. They were among the 16 people who fell
victim to assassins in the city on Tuesday.
Fahim Commando, 25, Zeeshan Haider Abedi, 30,Yousuf Rizwan, 25, and
one unidentified person had been arrested by law enforcement agencies
on Aug. 6 in Nazimabad. They were in judicial custody till Monday. On
Tuesday they were taken to the Airport Police Station from the Karachi
Central Prison for further questioning.
The police claimed they were escorting Fahim and his accomplices to
Nazimabad to conduct a raid on a house for the arrest of some more
suspects involved with them in criminal bouts when they were ambushed.
The MQM men, who were all fettered, were killed. None of the policemen
was injured.
The police said they were wanted in more than 25 cases, including
those related with the killings of SHO Bahadur Ali, DSP Hakim Khan
Tanoli and Haqiqi leader Mansoor Chacha, and were sent to jail.
Manzoor Qadar, a sub-inspector of the CIA police, was shot dead near
Dehli Muslim Hotel in North Nazimabad. Two electricians, were shot
dead in Sarhad Itehad Colony near the Khajji Ground in New Gulbahar.
The police said they were in their house on the third storey when
unidentified persons barged into it and gunned them down. Both were
bachelors. In a similar incident, armed men killed a man and his wife
in their house in Data Nagri, New Karachi.
A driver and a commuter were gunned down when unidentified men opened
fire on a passenger coach near a bus-stop in Orangi Town. Some
unidentified men gunned down two MQM activists in Korangi.
Police said Mohammad Safdar, 22, Mohammad Imran, 23, and Mohammad
Pervez, 24, were sitting in a hotel near Masjid Darussalam when some
unidentified persons riding a yellow cab fired at them and fled. The
MQM alleged that the police had killed them during the siege of a
house where they were fast asleep.
The police, however, said Safdar, Imran and Pervez were involved in a
number of criminal cases. Pervez was wounded and taken to the JPMC
where he died. Two other unidentified people were shot dead in Orangi
Town.
951012
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One killed, six vehicles torched
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 11: One person was shot dead, three were wounded and six
vehicles set ablaze in the city on Wednesday.
Some unidentified men also opened fire on the residence of Sindh
minister for excise and taxation Mir Munawar Ali Talpur and escaped.
According to reports, a gang of unidentified gunmen riding a car fired
shots on ministers residence and fled when the guards retaliated.
The body of a young man with bullet holes was found near a graveyard
in Al-Falah area. The police identified him as Mohammad Akram Bhutto,
He was tortured and shot dead after being kidnapped.
Three persons were wounded in various incidents of shooting. Raees,
was injured in Gulbahar, Abul-Fazal in Liaquatabad and Javed in the
Preedy area.
The unidentified arsonists set six vehicles on fire. A KESC van was
set ablaze in Buffer Zone, a bus in the Garden area, a Suzuki near F.B
Area, a car in Sharifabad and two vehicles in Liaquatabad.
Official sources, however, did not confirm burning of vehicles in
Liaquatabad.
951006
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Dehlavi gets govts reply; decision on talks today
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 5: The governments reply to the letter of chief MQM
negotiator Ajmal Dehlavi was delivered to him on Thursday evening but
Mr Dehlavi said not all the irritants had been removed.
Mr Dehlavi said his committee would, however, discuss the contents of
the letter on Friday and a decision on whether to resume the talks
would be taken after that. If the governments reply is positive, we
will resume negotiations, said Mr Dehlavi.
Meanwhile, chief government negotiator N.D. Khan told Dawn the reply
has been sent with all sincerity because we are trying to seek a
political settlement to the Karachi problem.
But the issue of the release of Shazia Farooq has created confusion as
Mr Dehlavi said she had not yet been released as promised by a member
of the government negotiating team, whereas the chief government
negotiator said the lady in question was Shania, wife of Fahim
Commando.
Mr Dehlavi, when contacted, said his side had never asked for the
release of anyone named Shania. This is a new development and we will
take it into consideration at our meeting, he emphasised.
Mr Dehlavi said there were no indications about the restoration of
police guards for the security of the negotiating team members.
Shaikh Liaquat Hussain confirmed that his passport was personally
delivered to him by Mr Zuhair Akram Nadeem.
Mr Hussain during a meeting with Mr Nadeem emphasised the need to find
out why Shazia Farooq was not yet released.
951007
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MQM says govt reply disappointing
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 6: Hopes for an early resumption of the stalled talks
between MQM and the government were dashed on Friday after the MQM
negotiating team termed the government reply as disappointing.
The MQM had linked resumption of talks with a positive reply to its
letter. As a consequence to the decision the MQM team has decided not
to resume talks for the time being, said the chief MQM negotiator,
Ajmal Dehlavi.
In a brief statement issued after the meeting it said that a written
response to Mr Khans reply would be sent to him in a couple of days.
Since the MQM would itself take a couple of days to send a written
formulation after which the government side would also require a few
more days to spell out its position, the talks are not expected to be
resumed before next week, sources close to the MQM negotiating said.
Mr Dehlavi was cautious in replying to questions about the details of
the meeting and said we have deliberately kept the statement brief
because we dont want to further escalate the controversy.
951007
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Altaf sends documents to ICJ
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Staff Correspondent
LONDON, Oct 6: In a letter addressed to the President of the
International Court of Justice at The Hague, the MQM has forwarded to
him legal documents about the arrest and the subsequent death of an
MQM worker Ferozeuddin with two other party workers, Pervaiz Akhtar
and Mohammed Ali, who, it is alleged, were killed by the rangers and
the police, while the killings were described officially to have
occurred in encounters with the police.
The letter from the MQM leader, Mr Altaf Hussain, says that the
purpose of sending you the present set of documents is to reveal the
starting sequence of events which establish the determined policy of
the Bhutto government to simply physically eliminate the MQM workers
in the custody of the paramilitary rangers or the police through cold
blooded murders.
The documents attached with the letter show that Ferozeuddin was
arrested on Sept 20, according to the police, after an exchange of
gunfire with some weapons and wireless sets. On the next day, he was
produced before a magistrate who, despite a request for two weeks
remand, only allowed the police one week remand of the detainee.
Later, he was produced before the Special Terrorist Judge by the
police which sought a weeks further remand. But the judge having seen
marks of violence on his body ordered his transfer to judicial
custody. But this order was ignored and the rangers took him to an
unknown place where he was done to death along with two other detained
MQM workers, the letter alleges.
The MQM leader has said that criminal cases should be registered,
after investigation, against those who are responsible for the alleged
killings. He has also accused the minister of interior, Naseerullah
Babar, under whose instructions the rangers and the police are
carrying out relentless killings of Mohajirs. They do not have the
slightest regard for law or legality, he writes.
He has invoked the additional protocol of the Geneva Convention, which
applies to persons captured in internal conflict, and has accused the
interior minister, the Sindh chief minister and others of violating
the international law.
Copies of the letter have also been sent to the President and the army
chief of Pakistan, to the British prime minister and the Us president,
the International Red Cross, the Secretary-General of the United
Nations, the president of the European Parliament, officials of the US
State Department and the chief justices of the Supreme Court and Sindh
high court in Pakistan.
951008
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Altaf seeks peoples help
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Staff Correspondent
LONDON, Oct 7: The political leadership in Pakistan and the people of
the country have been asked by the MQM leader, Mr Altaf Hussain, to
counter the nefarious intentions and actions of the Bhutto
government which, he alleged, was trying to create a catastrophic
civil war in the country.
Mr Hussain claimed that arms were being brought for distribution among
criminal elements and the Haqiqi group under the patronage of the
minister of interior and with the collusion of the chief minister
Sherpao of NWFP.
Mr Hussain said this was being done to destroy the MQM which has
demolished the political credentials of the Pakistan Peoples Party in
Sindh. He said the former chief minister of NWFP, Mr Sabir Shah, has
also accused the government of planning to weaken and destroy the
political opposition by supply arms to certain elements in Karachi and
the rest of Sindh.
In another statement, the MQM leader has expressed his concern over
the use of Frontier Constabulary and the Federal militia in and around
the Sui area to expel Baloch followers of opposition leader, Sardar
Akbar Bugti. He said this action would create another class of
Mohajirs in Balochistan. He talked to Sardar Bugti over the telephone
and backed his call for international assistance. Mr Hussain
criticised the President for his apathy in not stopping the
government from its unlawful actions.
951010
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MQM sends reply to govt
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KARACHI, Oct 9: The negotiating team of the MQM on Monday sent the
reply to the letter of Mr N.D. Khan, leader of the governments
negotiating team.
Ajmal Dehlavi, leader of the MQM negotiating team said here on Monday
night that they had sent their reply to the letter of Mr Khan by fax
on his Karachi and Islamabad addresses.
Earlier, he said the MQM negotiating team discussed the contents of
the letter of Mr Khan and prepared their reply in the light of the
same.
However, he did not disclose the contents of his reply.
951010
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Dehlavi criticises attack on Secretariat
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 9: Chief MQM negotiator Ajmal Dehlavi on Monday condemned
the targeted rocket attack on the New Sindh Secretariat. It seems to
be the job of expert marksmen who hit the predetermined targets and as
far as the MQM is concerned, we condemn such acts he said.
He said if it would have been the job of amateurs, the surrounding
dwellings of Mohajirs would have been badly damaged.
So far, he said, contrary to previous occasions Sindh Chief Minister
Abdullah Shah and interior Minister Naseerullah Babar had not
implicated the MQM.
Mr Dehlavi said the incident was a targeted exercise as the rockets
dropped on target. In the context of MQM-government talks, Mr Dehlavi
said he had faxed the written reply to ND Khan to his Islamabad
office. However, since the law minister had arrived in the city
another copy was faxed to Zuhair Akram Nadeem for passing it on to
him, said Mr Dehlavi.
He declined to divulge contents of his letter, saying although the
government side had breached the understanding by releasing part of
its communication to the Press.
951011
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Altaf accuses police of murder in custody
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Correspondent Report
LONDON, Oct. 10: The MQM leadership has endorsed the call given by the
partys co-ordination committee for a strike on Thursday as a protest
against the killing on Tuesday of seven MQM workers, four of whom are
alleged to have been killed while still in police custody.
The MQM leader has said he has been outraged at the direct
executions by the police of four of his party workers while in
judicial custody. He said seven MQM workers were gunned down by the
police and rangers in two different alleged encounters. Four of them
Faheem Farooqi, Zeeshan Haider Abidi, Yousuf Rizwan and Altaf
Qureshi had been under arrest since Aug. 6. Until yesterday they
were held in judicial custody in Karachi Central Jail.
On Tuesday morning, he alleged, they were taken under police
supervision to Nazimabad police station where they were killed.
Hussain claimed that medical reports showed they were shot at point
blank range. But officials say that when they were escorted to the
police station for identification, they came under sniper fire from
unknown sources.
The MQM leader has emphasised that according to the official version
the four persons were handcuffed and were under heavy police escorts.
It was surprising that not one person from the police escort was
injured by shots from the unknown gunmen. He described the police
version as a sheer concoction of lies and said: Such inhuman and
medieval actions of state terrorism were unmatched in the history of
Pakistan and depicted the worst tyranny of the Government. At least
10 MQM workers in judicial custody have been eliminated within the
last few weeks, he added.
Hussain called upon the president and the army chief to use their
influence and legal and moral authority so that legal proceedings
could be initiated against those responsible for the latest tragedy.
He also held the minister of interior, who is conducting the operation
in Karachi, responsible for the killings.
He claimed that the same police officer was in charge of escorting the
four MQM workers killed on Tuesday who led another escort on Aug. 2
when four other party workers were killed, near the airport, allegedly
by snipers fired. He said no legal system that allowed such barbarity
could be respected. He warned that the circumstances were now beyond
the stage where such acts of state terrorism could be tolerated by the
people any longer.
951011
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Babar blames MQM for rocket attack
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Staff Report
KARACHI, Oct. 10: Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar has blamed the
Mohajir Qaumi Movement for the rocket-propelled grenade attack on the
new Sindh secretariat building on Monday, but could not explain the
killing of under-custody alleged terrorists on Tuesday.
Speaking at a news conference, he did not oppose a judicial inquiry
into the killings of under-custody terrorists who belonged to the
MQM.
With regard to the attack on the secretariat, the minister conceded
that it was not unexpected, and said: I was told by the IG police on
Sunday that the MQM will change its tactics. But the minister had no
convincing reply when questioned about the laxity of security measures
around the secretariat when stepped-up attacks were feared.
The authorities, he said, had the reports that the Altaf Group
might resort to blasts or some other similar acts. Gen Babar said the
terrorists looked quite trained and it was believed they had
fired from three different directions from an under-construction house
just behind the secretariat building. He asserted that no rocket had
been fired from the car in which the terrorists had come. However,
one rocket might have been fired from a corner of the street at the
back of the secretariat, he added.
Ballistic experts of the army were also examining the points from
where the rockets might have been fired, he said. He noted that the
penetration of rockets was not that much as was expected from a PRG-7
rocket and that was why the damage was not so serious.
The interior minister said he could not say whether the chief
ministers secretariat or the office of Health Minister Shamim Ahmed
were the targets. But one thing was clear that their intentions were
not good because they also hit the record room where files concerning
the Karachi development package were kept and which were destroyed.
To a question, he said he was not aware of the presence of any
American FBI people at the secretariat. He said he had come to know
about their presence there only through newspapers on Tuesday.
The minister did not rule out the possibility of some other
professionally trained groups being involved in the attack. He
nevertheless tended to put the blame on the Naim Sheri group of the
MQM because, according to him, this group had been involved in such
acts in the past as well.
When informed that Altaf Hussain had condemned the rocket attack, the
minister asked with what kind of words for condemnation he has come
out.
951012
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Altaf asks supporters to remain united
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Staff Correspondent
LONDON, Oct 11: The MQM leader Altaf Hussain has said that no
government has a right to kill people wanted by it without proper
trial.
Commenting on the death of Fahim Commando and others he said the
killing of MQM workers by the government in fake police encounters
was not only a blatant violation of the Constitution and the law but
was an insult to democracy and human values. The MQM chief said the
way the Government was killing Mohajir youth in false encounters and
if in response people in future take up arms in their defence they
will be perfectly justified to do so, as to protect ones life and
property is a fundamental, constitutional and Islamic right which no
one can usurp.
Backing the call given by the MQM coordination committee to observe a
day of protest on Thursday against the killings on Tuesday of several
MQM workers, some of whom were under judicial custody and had been
brought from prison to a police station, Mr Altaf Hussain reminded the
President and the Prime Minister that those killed were not animals
but human beings. He pledged to make the people responsible for these
killings accountable and said they or their patrons will never be
forgiven.
Mr Hussain asked his supporters to remain united and disciplined as
victory will be of those who are oppressed. He appealed to the
political leadership in the country and other right thinking people to
come forward to end the present bloodshed. Indifference, he warned,
may be costly and the Mohajirs may come to a conclusion which they
could never have imagined.
He claimed that the fourth person to be killed in Nazimabad on
Tuesday, with three others who were brought from jail, was Khurshid
Anwar. Mr Hussain rejected the interior ministers statement of
Tuesday in which he told pressmen that three MQM workers, Fahim
Faruqi, Zeeshan Abidi, and Yousuf Rehman were killed by sniper fire
when they were brought to Nazimabad from jail for identification of
some other suspects. The minister had stated that another person was
injured when police fired back at the snipers, one of whom died. The
name of the injured was given as Khurshid Anwar and the Minister said
he was now in custody and two of his sisters had also been arrested.
Mr Hussain said Khurshid Anwar, after being tortured, following his
arrest at 3 am, was also killed with the three other MQM workers.
951012
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MQM strike today
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 11: The MQM coordination committee on Wednesday urged the
people of all walks of life to lend their support for a peaceful day
of protest on Thursday to mourn killing of its seven activists
allegedly by the law enforcement agencies.
Meanwhile tension was mounting as some political elements opposed to
the MQM had declared to defy the strike call.
951012
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SDM to probe into killing of three MQM activists
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Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 11: The deputy commissioner, district central, has
appointed SDM, Nazimabad, to conduct an inquiry into the gory incident
in which the handcuffed and fettered MQM workers Fahim Commando,
Yousuf Rizwan, Zeeshan Haider and one unidentified man were killed
in Nazimabad in Tuesday while they were in police custody.
Meanwhile, an MQM spokesman on Wednesday identified the so called
unidentified man as Khursheed Anwar killed in police custody. He also
claimed that the police had arrested Khursheeds two sisters Shaista
and Shagufta on Tuesday.
None of the policemen, who had escorted them to Nazimabad to identify
some other suspects at a hideout there, was injured. Eyewitnesses said
they were killed in front of a deserted house in a street through
which a car can hardly pass. The assassins, after killing them, had
managed to escape from the place.
The bodies of two of them were found in the courtyard of the house, an
Edhi volunteer, who had gone their to transport bodies to hospital,
said.
Hospital sources said autopsy performed on the victims showed that
they were shot dead from behind at point-blank range.
The sources said that Fahim and two other accomplices were taken to
Islamabad for further interrogation. They were brought back to Karachi
and sent to jail. The airport police, after a court permission, had
taken them into custody for interrogation on Tuesday morning to
Nazimabad.
The police claimed they had come under fire by unidentified men when
they arrived in front of the house where a raid was about to be
conducted. Fahim and others died on the spot, and the policemen had to
take refuge in the APC.
There was confusion about the death of Khursheed Anwar, who was
reportedly arrested by the police at 3 am on Wednesday.
Federal Interior Minister Naseerullah Babar had himself at a Press
conference on Tuesday confirmed the arrest of Khursheed Anwar and said
he was in police custody.
Nusrat Nadim, the political secretary of MQM chief Altaf Hussain,
claimed that the fourth unidentified person killed on Tuesday in
Nazimabad was Khursheed Anwar.
951012
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4 MQM men arrested
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KARACHI, Oct 11: The CIA Police, here, arrested four Altaf group
terrorists and seized four pistols and bullets from their
possession.
According to police sources CIA had posted various police parties in
different parts of the city to arrest the terrorists, who could try to
harass the people in connection with the Altaf groups strike call on
Thursday.
A CIA Saddar police party, which was posted at Pak Colony area, traced
suspect terrorists, who were firing in the air to terrorise the
people while riding a car. On seeing the police, they fired at them.
Police returned the fire resulting in arrest of Muhammad Amin alias
TT, Muhammad Ayoub, Shamsuddin and Nasir Ganja.
951007
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PPP voters leaving party, claims PML leader
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Staff Correspondent
NAWABSHAH, Oct 6: The co-ordinating secretary of PML, Sindh, Mumtaz
Ali Rind, claimed here on Friday that a large number of voters from
the constituency of Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had joined his
party.
Talking to this correspondent, he said people now supported Mian
Mohammad Nawaz Sharif and had also opened offices of the PML in the
native town of Ms Bhutto which, he added, was an ample proof that they
had rejected her.
Mr Rind said the struggle by the PML chief for the rights of poor
people throughout the country had created pro-PML sentiments among
them. The government had failed in solving the problems.
Mr Rid accused the PPP leadership of awarding all the jobs to
jiyalas while the well-educated, talented and intelligent but poor
youths were denied employment.
On the other hand, he alleged, the development funds were being
misappropriated in the province by the PPPs favourite contractors in
collusion with the concerned authorities.
951007
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Govt to discuss issue of members production with opposition
-------------------------------------------------------------------
ISLAMABAD, Oct 6: Federal law minister Mr N. D. Khan said on Friday
that the government has sought the help of the makers of the rule 90
to know their point of views on it to make it applicable in the
present circumstances.
The rule 90, in the National Assembly and rule 72, in the Senate has
been the core issue resulting in many a heated debates between the
government and the opposition in both the houses.
Talking at APP, Forum the minister said that it was decided to convene
a meeting before the next session to thoroughly examine the issue so
as to decide that how the objective laid down in the rule regarding
the production of detained members in the Parliament could be
achieved.
The minister was of the view that the only way out to solve the issue
would be to review the rule 90 to ensure its implementation and to
make it possible, the consensus among the government and opposition is
a must.
As both the chair and the government have not been authorised by the
rule to summon the detained members who are either in the custody of
the judiciary or in the administrative control of the provincial
governments.
He said MQM was a faction, and it could easily be merged by a like-
minded. He said the 1993 elections have given a clear messagea two-
party system.
He categorically said that no mid-term elections were possible and
castigated the PML call for staging of demonstrations on Oct 19. It
will muster no support as its past aimless drill which was in the
name of tehreek-i-nijat. The one-point agenda with Mian Nawaz Sharif
seems to be to seek mid-term elections, shorten the tenure of the
government. Instead, its time for the PML to prepare a policy how to
win the forthcoming general polls of 1988, rather than waste time in
flimsy things.
He denied that any human rights violations were being committed in
Karachi, as alleged by Mr Altaf Hussain, in his letter to the UN
Secretary-General.
About Govt-Altaf group talks, he said, the same were being conducted
on quid-pro-quo basis and the former believed that the latter had
mandate from Karachi.
He told a questioner that he would soon furnish a reply to Dehlavis
letter soon. He regretted that the MQM had unilaterally suspended
dialogue for which it was itself responsible. He hoped wisdom would
prevail and the talks would resume.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
PML unity talks today amid hopes & scepticism
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Ashraf Mumtaz
LAHORE, Oct 7: The first meeting of the committees set up by the
PML(N) and the PML(J) to explore possibility of reunification of the
two factions is due to be held here on Sunday with conflicting
assessments from the two sides about the outcome.
PML(J) sources are not very optimistic about a breakthrough. The two
sides are poles apart and thus no high hopes should be pinned on the
meeting, authoritative PML(J) sources said on Saturday.
The sources alleged that Mian Nawaz Sharif wanted to break the PDF and
oust Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto which the PML(J) did not favour.
Mr Chattha had once proposed that the presidents of all factions
should step down and let the party elect a new party chief. The
formula was not acceptable to Mian Nawaz Sharif. Other party leaders
have been saying that the chairmanship of Mr Sharif is not negotiable
as the credit for making the PML a popular party went exclusively to
him. The PML(J) could be offered other offices in the party if they
were interested in the partys unity, provincial PML(N) president
Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi had said a few days ago.
But just a day before the talks, PML(N) sources report that Mr Sharif
could be ready to step down provided PML(J) ministers in the cabinet
resigned.
The condition has created doubts in the minds of the PML(J) leaders
who say that they would not trust Mr Sharif even if he expressed his
willingness to step down as head of his faction.
Another consideration for the PML(J) would be whether the united party
could work with leaders like Wali Khan, Altaf Hussain and Mahmud
Achakzai. He implied that while these leaders were allies of Mr
Sharif, the PML(J) would not like to join hands with them.
Another leader said the possibility of unity between the two factions
was remote as Mr Sharif believed in the politics of confrontation
which was not the case with the PML(J).
The chances of the two sides coming close were also dimmed by a sudden
revolt in the PML(J) parliamentary party in the NWFP. Of the four
PML(J) MPAs, three have opposed the unity efforts and declared that
they would not be party to such moves. The fourth, Saleem Saifullah,
is a member of the PML(J) committee for the talks.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Noorani supports black day call
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Report
LAHORE, Oct 7: Jamiat Ulema-i-Pakistan president Maulana Shah Ahmed
Noorani on Saturday added his voice to the opposition demand for mid-
term elections, saying that the Benazir government had failed to
honour the commitments it had made in its 1993 election manifesto. He
also backed the oppositions plan to observe Oct 19 as a black day.
JUP leaders K.M. Azhar and Muhammad Khan Leghari were also present.
the JUP president said it was a fact that until a few months back he
was in favour of allowing the present assemblies to complete their
term. However, he said, he had changed his opinion and now favoured
the demand for early polls because of the disappointing performance of
the government.
Maulana Noorani said he was ready to hold unity talks with the rival
JUP faction. He said talks between the two sides would be possible
when the other side also wished to re-unite. Maulana Noorani did not
know whether the Niazi group had constituted any committee to hold
unity talks.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Military should not interfere in internal affairs, seminar told
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 7: Military should not intervene in the internal affairs
on any pretext and it should be restructured through cost-effective
measures to meet the future hi-tech threat.
Concern was also expressed over continuing violence in Karachi which
was causing internal instability and thus affecting the overall
defence capability.
Mr Shahi said India and Pakistan were believed to have reached a
condition of non-weaponised deterrence in which either of them could
move quickly to produce a nuclear weapon if wished. Hence, he said,
South Asia would never again see a conventional war, since any such
war could quickly turn nuclear.
Mr Shahi was of the view that while Pakistans nuclear programme
remained frozen since January 1989, India continued to produce
weapons-grade plutonium without interruption.
Mr Shahi also dealt with the Brown amendment and Pakistans relations
with the US and the regional countries.
Dr.Shireen Mazari said that there is an urgent need for countries
like Pakistan to frame their security policies after acknowledging the
continuing legitimacy of the instrumentality of war and the resurgence
of the rationality of military power as a viable policy option.
She questioned the wisdom of following the US blindly in the
international peacekeeping role. She said there was no rationale in
Pakistans peacekeeping role in Haiti and Somalia.
Former navy chief vice Admiral H.M.S. Choudri while speaking on the
importance of sea power emphasised the need for cost- effective
defence. His views were also shared by Air Marshal Ayaz Ahmed Khan.
Giving his views on threat perception, General K.M. Arif, spelt out
his views in the global, regional and south Asian context. He, held
the view that internal stability was a must to ensure effective
defence of the country.
He was of the view that Pakistan did not have a viable Afghan policy
while Iran was vital to Pakistans security.
In the context of the role of the armed forces, he said It gives no
power to the military to intervene in the internal affairs on any
pretext.
Altaf Gauhar was of the view that the greatest security problem of
Pakistan was in Karachi.
Orders to shoot at sight, blindfolding the people, rounding womenfolk
in the middle of the night and after some time accusing them of
running a brothel were detrimental to Pakistans interest.
I dont know whether Altaf Hussain is a traitor or not but we are
certainly ashamed of the way we are treating our citizens in Karachi,
said Mr Gauhar while commenting on the peace-keeping role of law
enforcement agencies.
Gen. Kamal Mateenuddin was of the view that conventional deterrent
must be geared up and all elements of national power must be utilised
to ensure credible defence. He was against nuclear option.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
New alliance to counter strikes
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 7: The founder of Sindh Yekjehti Alliance, Malik Ghulam
Sarwar Awan, announced on Saturday that the newly-formed alliance of
Punjabis, Pakhtuns, Sindhis, Balochs and Urdu-speaking people would in
future attempt to stop the MQM from paralysing the city through their
strikes.
Addressing the alliance of seven political parties groups at a local
hotel, Mr Awan announced that the alliance of like-minded persons
would try to ensure that businesses stayed open and transporters plied
their vehicles even during strike call days.
If they burn one vehicle of Punjabis and Pakhtuns, we will burn 100
vehicles of MQM supporters, he told a cheering crowd, mostly
comprising transporters.
The alliance, which includes PPI, National Democratic Front, Muslim
Welfare Movement, Pakistan Mazloom Ittehad Party, Pakistan Transport
Federation, Sindhi Action Committee and Pakistan Minority Ittehad, was
also addressed by their representatives.
The PPI supreme council members took oath, supporting the peaceful
goals outlined by the alliance.
Abdur Rauf Khan Sasoli of NDF invited MQM chief Altaf Hussein to join
the alliance in struggling for the rights of the oppressed people,
adding that the massacre of poor and unarmed civilians will not solve
the problem.
Resolutions passed on the occasion included a demand to curb the
growing thefts and dacoities in Lyari, an appeal to banks to waive the
instalments taken by transporters this year and a call to the
government to permit licensed weapons to ordinary citizens for self-
defence.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
PM "mortgaging sovereignty" of state, says Nawaz
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bureau Report
LAHORE, Oct 7: Opposition leader Mian Nawaz Sharif alleged on Saturday
that Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto was mortgaging the sovereignty of
the country so that she could become Secretary-General of the United
Nations.
For this purpose, he claimed, she could extend clandestine support to
India to become a permanent member of the UN Security Council for
which it was aspiring for quite some time.
He said Ms Bhutto wanted to become head of the world body because she
knew that this was the only way to save herself from public wrath and
the billions and trillions, he alleged, she had amassed with the
help of her husband.
He held the prime minister responsible for all problems facing the
country and said a single solution of all problems lies in getting
rid of the prime minister and her husband Asif Zardari.
Rejecting the allegation that he went to meet MQM chief Altaf Husain
in London to urge him to give a strike call in Pakistan, Mr Sharif
said he did not need anyones help for a shutdown of business. My
personal appeal to the people is sufficient to ensure a strike in the
country.
The opposition leader said the talks between the government and the
MQM had failed to produce any results. He claimed that the alienation
of Karachi was complete because of the policies of the present
government.
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Murtaza lashes out at Benazir
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
QUETTA, Oct 7: Mir Murtaza Bhutto, chairman of the PPP (Shaheed
Bhutto), said here on Saturday that Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had
failed to deliver the goods despite being in power twice, adding Ms
Bhuttos claim of leading Shaheed Z.A. Bhuttos PPP was totally wrong
and misleading.
Her PPP is party of Asif Zardari, dacoits and waderas, he told a
well-attended public meeting. He claimed that Benazir Bhutto is no
more the chairperson of the PPP as all the decisions of the party were
taken by Asif Zardari.
He accused Ms Benazir Bhutto of compromising with those who were
responsible for the murder of the party founding chairman.
He also flayed the opposition leader Nawaz Sharif and late Gen Zia-ul-
Haq and regretted that Benazirs days in power were also not better.
He said, Gen Zia was enemy of Islam and Pakistan for he divided the
people on religious, ethnic and linguistic basis.
951009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Awan made Punjabs senior minister
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bureau Report
LAHORE, Oct. 8: Minister for Local Government Malik Mushtaq Awan was
appointed senior minister of Punjab on Sunday.
The decision was taken unanimously at a meeting of the PDF
parliamentary party held at the State Guest House. The office of the
senior minister had fallen vacant as a result of the death of Makhdoom
Altaf Ahmed on Sept. 2.
With his appointment as senior minister, Awan will now head the
departments of Home and SGAD. He will continue to be provincial
president of the PPP.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Rockets tear into Sindh secretariat : no casualties
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Mohammed Riaz
KARACHI, Oct 9: In a 10-minute operation, beginning at 12:13 pm, on
Monday, terrorists fired six Russian-made rockets at the New Sindh
Secretariat building, which hit the New Secretariat block, the hub of
the administration, and rocked the residential area and commercial
centres.
Soon after the incident, the police cordoned off the area and rounded
up many shopkeepers for interrogation.
The terrorists had fired the rockets from three different directions
at the Secretariat building, causing extensive damage to the fifth,
sixth and seventh floors.
The offices of two ministers, secretaries and section officers were
completely damaged, but there were no casualties. Flying pieces of
window-panes, however, wounded four people.
A fire broke out after an explosion in the office of a section officer
on the fifth floor, destroying records piled up in the corridor. As
the fire spread, records, stored on steel racks, were also burnt.
Offices of the Health Minister Shamim Ahmad, who defected from the
MQM, also on the seventh floor, were the prime target as the blast
ripped off the secretarial section, causing extensive damage.
Commenting on the attacks on selected offices, a high-ranking Sindh
official said: It shows that the terrorists were well- informed about
the location of offices they wanted to attack.
Sindh minister Haji Zafar Ahmad Leghari held the MQM and Indian agents
responsible for the attack.
About the FBI agents, he said: They have come of their own accord. We
didnt invite them. However, their help is sought in the course of
this complicated situation.
When the FBI agents were asked who had asked them to visit the rocket-
hit offices, they remained silent.
A peon said policemen on pickets atop the boundary wall were the first
to flee after the blast.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Shah fears more attacks, orders tighter security
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Habib Khan Ghori
KARACHI, Oct 9: Sindh Chief Minister Syed Abdullah Shah said on Monday
he feared more rocket attacks and directed the police to beef up
security. He said: This is open terrorism and should be condemned by
all.
The chief minister found a group of newsmen waiting for him after he
completed his tour of the attack at the offices hit by rockets and
expressed satisfaction that there had been no casualties.
In reply to a question, he said: It is certainly a security lapse.
The police should have been more alert. We will not let the attackers
go scott free. We will fight terrorists till they are eliminated.
He appealed to people, particularly those who might have seen the
terrorists to cooperate with the authorities in identifying them.
He said four out of 28 police personnel who were on duty at the
secretariat had been taken into custody for failing in their duty.
Mr Shah warned that there was no place for cowards to remain in the
police and the government would not brook any neglect of duty by those
supposed to protect the peoples lives.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Ministers, others condemn rocket attack
-------------------------------------------------------------------
KARACHI, Oct 9: Leaders of political parties and ministers have
condemned the rocket attack on Sindh Secretariat building on Monday,
and termed it a cowardly act by terrorists.
Provincial Health Minister Shamim Ahmed said, in fact, he was the
target of rocket attack as two of the rockets landed at his office
causing serious damage.
The health minister who escaped the attack as he was holding a meeting
at his residence, said the situation was serious in view of the
threats of civil war by Altaf Hussain. He said, it is Altaf Hussain
who speaks about civil war but involves the government and holds it
responsible for the war.
The health Minister said many-a-times in the past he asked the IGP and
DIG for enhanced security. He said there were no security arrangements
even at his house. If terrorists can target me at the Sindh
Secretariat, they can repeat the same at my residence, as well, he
said.
He said that the government, had mobilised all its resources for an
early arrest of terrorists involved in rocket attack.
They were talking to people in the Secretariat building during their
visit after the rocket attack. Murad Ali Shah said Secretariat
building was a national property and anybody attacking such buildings
should be censured.
He said it was not an attack on government building, but an attack on
people who come there for the redressal of their grievances. He said
people belonging to every community work and visit in these buildings
daily.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Murtaza demands mid-term poll
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Correspondent
QUETTA, Oct 9: Mir Murtaza Bhutto chairman of the PPP (SB) has said
that to avoid extra-constitutional steps, holding of mid-term
elections was a desirable option to save democracy.
Although holding of elections since 1988 had no positive results yet
the countrys situation demand early polls, said Mr Bhutto. We
support the mid-term polls to block the way for army intervention
which would pave the way for dictatorship as it is a better solution
rather to push the country towards civil war, Murtaza observed.
PPP leader announced his party would participate in the mid-term polls
if announced.
Referring to the Karachi problem, he claimed that terrorists
activities were going on due to intra feud between two factions of
MQM. However, other factors could not be ruled out, particularly the
involvement of drug mafia, land mafia and other criminal groups
besides the presence of three million illegal immigrants there.
PPP leader further said that local bodies elections should be held in
Karachi and other parts of the country so that people should resolve
their problems through their elected representatives.
He demanded that three million aliens should be expelled from Karachi
to help normalise the situation.
Replying to a question, the leader of PPP (SB) announced that he was
not ready to cooperate with those political parties which remained in
power and failed to deliver goods to common men.
About the formation of grand alliance against present government, he
said that his party would not join such alliance as we have our own
party programme in this connection.

951011
-------------------------------------------------------------------
PML divided on issue of observing black day
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Mohammad Malick
ISLAMABAD, Oct. 10: The top leadership of Pakistan Muslim League has
become sharply divided over the strategy of observing a Black Day on
Oct. 19 without following it up with an organised public agitation
against the government.
While party leaders are understandably refuting the presence of any
such differences, there is a clear split between those in favour of
any sort of political agitation and those opting for a delayed but
seriously planned offensive against the government instead of
whittling away of energies in such useless activities, as described
by one PML critic of the call.
The situation has come to such a head that two of its top leaders, Gen
Majid Malik and Chaudhry Nisar are no longer on talking terms with one
another and Gen Malik has even refused to attend any party meeting in
Chaudhry Nisars presence.
According to the supporters of the call, including Gohar Ayub Khan,
Ahsan Iqbal, Chaudhry Nisar and Mushahid Hussain, the opposition must
continue taking every possible pot-shot at the government instead of
waiting for one big street movement to come about. These hawks within
the party believe, as stated by Ahsan Iqbal, MNA: We must keep doing
something to keep the public aware of the governments wrongdoings and
also to boost the morale of our own party members.
951011
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Nawaz's bank accounts frozen
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Report
ISLAMABAD, Oct. 10: The bank account of Mian Nawaz Sharif and other
directors of Ittefaq group had been frozen for their failure to pay Rs
400 million outstanding against them as income and wealth tax. An
official spokesman said in a statement that Nawaz Sharif had not
discharged his national obligation of paying the income and wealth
tax.
According to Press reports Nawaz Sharif on assuming the office of
prime minister in 1990 had allegedly ordered authorities that the
amount outstanding against him and other directors as income and
various other taxes be written off. They, thereafter, submitted
applications to the authorities for this purpose. Their outstanding
amounts were written off the same day.
Later, Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto directed the authorities to
investigate the matter. The Income Tax Department also filed an appeal
against writing off the outstanding amount.
The appeal was accepted and the directors were ordered to pay Rs 400
million. Nawaz Sharif and the other directors did not comply with the
order. Therefore, their bank accounts have been frozen. The
outstanding amount will be realised from these accounts and by
auctioning their immovable property.
It is also of interest that one case of bad debt of Rs six billion is
also pending against Nawaz Sharif.
951012
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Pervaiz demands date for mid-term polls
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bureau Report
LAHORE, Oct 11: Opposition leader in the Punjab Assembly Chaudhry
Pervaiz Elahi demanded on Wednesday that the government should set a
date for mid-term elections and hold talks with the opposition on a
nine-point package offered by Mian Nawaz Sharif in October last year.
The nine-point package of Mr Sharif, it may be pointed out, requires
the president and the prime minister to resign before the talks.
He said it was a great injustice to allege that the opposition was
engaged in confrontation against the government. In fact, he alleged,
the government did not want to do anything for the welfare of the
people.
Mr Pervaiz Elahi, alleged that the government had stepped up
victimisation of the opposition legislators. He alleged that the
government was undermining the sovereignty of parliament and
intelligence agencies were being given a free hand.
Replying to a question he said Mr Sharif would not resign as head of
his faction for the sake of PML(N) and the PML(J) merger.
===================================================================

===================================================================
951009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
State Bank wants tax exemptions withdrawn
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Sabihuddin Ghausi
KARACHI, Oct. 8: Calling the rising level of prices in 1994-95 a
disturbing aspect of economic developments, the State Bank of
Pakistan, in its annual report released on Sunday, has suggested the
introduction of structural reforms in the budget to generate more
real resources through taxation of consumption and income.
The base of income tax needs to be expanded through inclusion of all
incomes, including agricultural income, and elimination of concessions
and exemptions that have become loopholes for tax evasion, is the key
suggestion offered in the SBP Annual Report for 1994-95.
While proposing the broadening of the income tax base and introduction
of a broad based, low rate consumption tax, the SBP report, at the
same time, has urged the government to continue and intensify the
expenditure restraint policy and has emphasised the need for an
improvement in the efficiency of public sector corporations.
The target of reducing the rate of inflation to a single digit level
is difficult but attainable, asserts the report while referring to
the 1995-96 budget targets which envisages reduction of inflation rate
to 9.5 % as against 12.9 % witnessed during 1994-95.
However, the report maintains that containing inflation rate within a
single digit level is possible provided higher economic growth is
reinforced by a reduction in monetary expansion which, in turn,
depends on the governments ability to contain budget deficit to 5 %
of GDP and governments borrowing from the banking system within the
Credit Plan target.
The SBP report calls for a well-planned programme for documentation of
the economy which, it stresses, is critically needed to restructure
the income and consumption taxes on modern lines. This, in
combination with rationalisation of the tariff structure and reduction
in statutory tax rates, would also help reduce the size of the
underground economy.
It also suggests the provincial governments and local bodies also need
to mount their own tax efforts to meet a part of their expenditures.
The public sector corporations also need to improve their efficiency,
and, in addition to servicing their debt, must give a reasonable rate
of return on public sector investment. It stresses the improvement in
tax administration and tax compliance.
Another major recommendation of the State Bank of Pakistan report is
the speedy privatisation of nationalised commercial banks and the
development financial institutions to effectively tackle the problems
of mounting default of loans and rising financial intermediation.
Terming the excessive loan defaults in NCBs a matter of great
concern, the report says that it has contributed to the high lending
rates and the lowering of rates of return on deposits.
The report attributes the high inflationary gap as measured by the
difference between the rates of monetary expansion and GDP growth as
the main cause of inflation in Pakistan which has extended over
several years including 1994-95.
In addition, a rise in world prices of Pakistans key imports, upward
adjustment in administered prices and reliance on indirect taxes for
the mobilisation of resources contributed to the increase in prices.
In 1994-95 the rate of inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price
Index (CPI), increased to 12.9% from 11.2% in 1993-94.
Partly, the supply side shortfalls, mainly because of adverse weather
conditions, heavy rains and floods affecting cotton production and
damaging the minor crops contributed to the increases in prices. But
the SBP report mainly blames the major slippages on the demand
management side as reflected in monetary expansion of 16.6% in 1994-
95 compared with target of 11.8% as the main contributing factor to
the inflation.
According to the report, all of the price indices in 1994-95 recorded
higher rates of increase as compared to 1993-94. The CPI recorded an
annual average increase of 12.9%, followed by GDP deflator, 14.8%, the
Sensitive Price Indicator by 15.5%, and the wholesale Price Index by
16.3%. A review of the indices showed that bulk of the increase in
prices during 1994-95 reflected the sharp rise in prices of food items
which, in fact, contributed 60% of the overall increase in WPI and
about two-thirds of overall increase in CPI.
The report says that several factors contributed to the
intensification of inflationary pressures in 1994-95. At the macro
level, the gap between the rates of growth of money supply and of
output (inflationary gap) was about 12 percentage points in 1994-95
compared to the target of 5 percentage points. In 1994-95 the
production growth was 4.7% as against the target of 6.9% while money
supply soared by 16.6% as against the projected rise of 11.8% and in
process expanded the inflationary gap by 12 percentage points.
The main cause of excessive money supply was public sector
borrowings, with government borrowing for budgetary support exceeding
the limits set in the Credit Plan in most of the year. In addition,
use of a part of the privatisation proceeds and short term foreign
borrowings towards the end of the year to finance budget deficit
exerted expansionary impact on money supply. Moreover, increased
borrowings by public sector corporations and enterprises, large
disbursement of credit by the Agricultural Development Bank of
Pakistan (ADBP) under its government sponsored credit schemes and
debiting of accrued mark up to the borrowers accounts by banks at the
end of the year was reflected in an increase in bank credit to the
private sector, the SBP report blames.
Among other factors, reported to have led to increase in cost of
living, was the scarcity of perishable food items. Similarly the
recent budgetary measures to raise resources in the public sector were
generally of high inflation intensity. Increase in prices of
petroleum, gas and electricity had both a direct effect on consumer
prices and indirect one. Indirect taxes were also immediately
translated into higher output prices. On the government side, a part
of even current expenditure was financed by borrowings. A sharp
increase on world prices of several of the essential imported items
also contributed in inflation. Additionally the depreciation of dollar
value in respect of other currencies did lead to an increase in the
rupee cost of imports. Hardening of the inflationary expectations and
hoarding of goods to make windfall profits were also contributory to
the inflation.
In the backdrop of the excess demand conditions that have prevailed
for the last several years and the entrenched inflationary
expectations, the SBP considers it imperative for the government to
pursue a tight fiscal and monetary policy in the foreseeable future.
Monetary restraint, in combination with expected high output growth
in 1995-96 and beyond, could begin to make a dent on inflationary
expectations and on inflation is the prescription being offered by
the SBP with a clear signal that micro level or sectoral measures to
combat inflation will succeed only in the context of improved
macroeconomic conditions.
For 1995-96 the SBP has proposed to contain the public sector
corporations borrowings, particularly the ADBP lending operations
within the Credit Plan limits. It has also suggested similar
restrictions of complying with planned credit limits for the private
sector.
Other area of major concern for the SBP is the substantial
accumulation of domestic and foreign debts leading to a sharp increase
in the debt servicing. Estimating the total national debt at the end
of June 1995 at Rs 1,554.6 billion, constituting 83.3% of 1994-95 GDP,
which includes Rs 796.8 billion domestic debt resulting in debt
servicing of Rs 101.9 billion, the SBP advises that it is, therefore,
vital that Pakistan determines the level of sustainable budget deficit
consistent with its revenue generation potential so as to avoid
getting into the vicious circle of rising debt services and higher
budget deficit.
Notwithstanding internal financial imbalances, the balance of payment
in 1994-95 showed improvement on several counts as exports grew by
17.9% as against negative growth in 1993-94, and there was a sharp
improvement of 20% in home remittances, and for the first time foreign
exchange reserves were built up with only a nominal increase in the
countrys short term liabilities.
Another redeeming feature has been more than 100% rise in foreign
investment to 1.53 billion dollars in 1994-95 from 0.65 billion
dollars in 1993-94. In 1994-95 the government successfully launched
150 million dollars bond.
Imports also swelled up by 16.7% because of the greater inflow of
capital goods mainly because of rise in the investment in the power,
export-oriented and technology intensive sectors. While noting an
appreciable rise in investment, the SBP report says that it can be
sustained over the long run only by increase in the level of domestic
savings. The national savings in 1994-95 declined to 14.8% from 15.7%
in 1993-94 mainly because of a fall in public sector savings although
private savings increased to 13.9% of GDP in 1994-95 from 13.1% of GDP
in 1993-94.
951009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Saudi Companys thinking of cancelling sugar deals
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Syed Rashid Husain
RIYADH, Oct. 8: The Saudi Chambers of Commerce and Industry has warned
the local Saudi traders against dealing with sugar traders in
Pakistan, press reports indicate. Saudi trading houses have also been
advised to review all their agreements with Pakistani trades dealing
in sugar and exporting to Saudi Arabia.
In view of the above directive from the local chamber, Saudi companies
are now thinking in terms of cancelling their agreements with
Pakistani traders. Australia and Brazil are vying to take over the
business lost by Pakistan.
The warning from the Saudi Chamber of Commerce and Industry was issued
after the Government of Pakistan cancelled all valid export licenses
issued to sugar plants and dealers and on the basis of which sugar
exporters from Pakistan had entered into business deals with their
Saudi counterparts.
Savola company one of the leading importers of sugar in the Kingdom
and who are also putting up a sugar refinery in collaboration with a
UK company, has already ceased dealings with Pakistan for its raw
sugar requirements. It is now importing raw sugar from countries other
than Pakistan in order to avoid losses because of sudden backing out
of the exporter from the agreement. Such a situation may put in
jeopardy the entire operation of big companies such as Savola. The
Saudi market consumes about 480,000 tons of Sugar per annum. The total
sugar required by the Kingdom is imported by five major companies from
world markets and is then repackaged here for retail sales.
Saudi sugar traders have pointed out that such overnight changes in
policy would affect the very credibility of Pakistani exporters and
their Saudi counterparts would be reluctant to place orders in future
with Pakistani traders. It shows a complete lack of planning and
inventory management. Pakistani government officials should have
properly projected the production and demand of sugar within Pakistan.
Only after such an evaluation they should have issued licenses for
export. But once these licenses were issued, the government should
have honoured it. Such short-sighted decisions would have a bearing on
Pakistans credibility and future exports.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Rs 50bn loss due to 15 strikes, says N D Khan
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 9: Renewing his call to the MQM to resume negotiations
aimed at restoring peace in Karachi, Federal Law Minister N.D. Khan
claimed on Monday that people would reject Mian Nawaz Sharifs call to
observe a black day on Oct 19.
Mr Khan said the economy suffered a loss of Rs.50 billion owing to 16
strikes in Karachi. This, he said, exposed elements who were harming
the national interests and pushing up inflation, prices and un-
employment.
Mr Khan, however, made it clear that the government will not bow to
any pressure, nor will it be blackmailed to even consider any thing
extra-constitutional in nature.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Steps to cut borrowings Fiscal situation to be monitored.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bureau Report
ISLAMABAD, Oct. 9: The government has authorised the State Bank to
resort to some fiscal management measures to avert excessive
borrowing if it found at the end of each month that expenditures had
exceeded receipts, on pro rata basis.
Dr Masood said the government had asked all the big public sector
bodies like, the WAPDA, PTC, State Bank and the collector of petroleum
and gas surcharges, to make their payments which he called lumpy
payments due to the government on monthly basis and we will enforce
this rule as strictly as we do with tax collection.
He said after close analysis the government had come to the conclusion
that bank borrowing should be monitored on monthly basis and income
and expenditure managed on pro rata basis.
He maintained that the 1995-96 budget targets were achievable. We
will meet the budgetary deficit target of 5 per cent and collect the
estimated revenues of Rs270 billion and the autonomous bodies would
earn enough profits to make their estimated contribution to the
budget.
According to him the economy was not facing any structural problems.
We are only facing a synchronisation problem. Nothing is wrong with
our policy stance.
He attributed excessive borrowing in the first quarter of the current
year partly to last years debt overhang.
Dr Ghafoor, additional secretary at the economic affairs division, who
assisted Dr Waqar during the briefing, answering a question, said the
serious depletion in foreign exchange reserves was due mainly to some
major repayments in September and non-reporting of receipts of project
and other foreign assistance in time. He rejected the suggestion that
the depletion of the FE reflected the reported 20 per cent decline in
exports, and said according to final estimates the decline in exports
in this period was not more than 5 per cent.
Earlier, the prime ministers press assistant Farhatullah Baber, who
opened the briefing, claimed that the state of the economy was not as
bad as was being presented by way of the Press. He claimed that the
positive aspects of the report were ignored by most of the newspapers.
He said while the government could not meet most of the economic
targets set for last year, there was, however, a distinct overall
improvement across the board compared to the situation obtaining in
the previous three years.
Mr Babar conceded that during the first quarter of the current year,
bank borrowing did actually reach a record Rs38 billion, but later, he
claimed, it came down to Rs27 billion.
He said that the government did not dispute the inflation figures, and
was doing everything possible to overcome the problem. But attributed
part of the blame for high inflation to costly edible oil imports and
partly to hoarding of sugar and other essential commodities.
951011
-------------------------------------------------------------------
World Bank report lauds SAP
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bureau Report
ISLAMABAD, Oct. 10: Pakistan is rated below countries with comparable
economies, in the field of education, fertility, nutrition and health,
according to a World Bank report on public and private initiatives,
released on Tuesday.
It said that even after years of vigorous economic growth, Pakistans
average family was large, poorly educated, undernourished and
unhealthy. Female illiteracy is among the highest in the world and
health, particularly in urban areas, is poor, the report said.
Although 40% of Pakistani women wanted to avoid pregnancy, family
planning services were weak and fertility rate was striking at 5.7%.
With the World Bank support, Pakistan had now embarked on the national
Social Action Programme (SAP) that encouraged individual communities
to improve social services themselves, with the ultimate aim of
bringing the countrys social indicators into line with its high level
of economic achievement, it said.
Projections suggested that returns on social investment in Pakistan,
both social and economic, would almost certainly outstrip other types
of investments, the report said.
Previous piecemeal attempts by the provinces, it said, had largely
failed, forcing Pakistan to commit itself to increase national
investment in the social service and to promote the ideal of smaller,
healthier, better-fed and better-educated families.
Under the plan, Pakistan would decentralise the delivery of social
services and clarify the various responsibilities of the four social
service agencies. It would also enter into annual agreements with
private sector providers, the performance of which would be assessed
on the basis of detailed operational plans and measurable targets, the
report said.
It said the most innovative feature of Pakistans SAP was its emphasis
on participatory development. Through non-governmental organisations
and other private institutions, the programme encouraged people to
initiate projects to improve social service within their own
community, the report added.
The participatory development programme, it said, would distribute $10
million in grants to community organisations, non-governmental
organisations, private institutions, foundations, academic and
research organisations and government agencies that came up with
community-based cost recovery schemes or ways to deliver services that
were better suited to local needs. The report said about 10,000 NGOs
were providing social services to communities throughout Pakistan and
were in a better position to identify projects and to organise, run
and mediate partnerships between small communities and the government.
951012
-------------------------------------------------------------------
World Bank faces funding crisis
-------------------------------------------------------------------
WASHINGTON, Oct 11: World Bank officials, facing a funding crisis of
unprecedented proportions, are appealing to the United States not to
shirk its responsibilities to the worlds 3 billion poor.
In his opening address to the Banks annual meeting, Wolfensohn made a
direct appeal to the Republican-controlled Congress to reconsider
reductions in the Banks International Development Association, which
provides low-cost loans to the worlds 78 poorest countries.
He said threatened US cuts would likely be matched by other wealthy
donor countries, resulting in a 50 % loss in planned IDA loans. He
said for every dollar cut by the United States, IDA could lose a total
of five dollars as other nations reduce their contributions
proportionately, he said.
While I cannot promise results, I can pledge our utmost effort to
restore proposed congressional cuts, Rubin said.
951012
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Concern over UBL sale move
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Staff Reporter
KARACHI, Oct 11: The United Group of Employees Management has
expressed concern over an advertisement published in a leading
newspaper about the sale of the United Bank and has asked the
Privatisation Commission to implement its policy of golden hand-shake
first.
In a statement, the UGEM also reminded the Privatisation Commission of
its promise to offer the bank to the employees for its purchase before
putting it for sale to others.
It also claimed that caution money of Rs 20,000 (non- refundable) was
also deposited with the Privatisation Commission, and accordingly, the
UGEM was the first party to deposit the amount and submit an
application in this regard.
After depositing the amount, the UGEM asked for forms as per rules and
regulations, but the request was turned down, stating that forms could
be had by Oct 23. The advertisement, however, showed that forms could
be obtained the same day when the caution money was deposited. The
refusal by the Privatisation Commission to give forms, according to
its own condition in the advertisement, after depositing the amount
showed violation of its own publication, the UGEM said.
The President of United Bank Employees Federation, Maqsood Ahmed
Farooqi, and the Secretary-General of United Bank Officers Federation,
Ghulam Ghouse Khan, also expressed concern over the sale
advertisement.
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951006
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Bare bones unrefuted
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Ardeshir Cowasjee
THE penultimate paragraph of my September 1 column, The bare bones,
quoting a sane senior Pakistani international civil servant, read:
There is a risk that Pakistan will join the many countries in Africa
and soon become one of the failed states. This risk draws closer every
day. The real fear is that if things slide as they are doing, sometime
early in the next century there may not be a State of Pakistan.
The conclusion was that I shared his foreboding, and I asked those who
disagreed to write in. The letters of 13 of those who did write to the
editor of this newspaper have been printed. Others have rung, and some
have written to me directly (one without naming himself for reasons
of security!). Only one man has disagreed with the prognosis Nazim
Haji, of the CPLC who by virtue of his chosen voluntary vocation lives
close to reality, misery, deprivation, coercion, torture, wanton
destruction and all that goes with them.
I disagree, he wrote, The way things are going, we will witness the
disaster much earlier. We will be lucky to celebrate our 50th
anniversary unless the silent majority (industrialists, traders,
workers, professionals lawyers, doctors, architects, etc writers,
enlightened politicians / civil servants / armed forces personnel,
housewives, etc, etc) wakes up and, preferably jointly, fight for
their rights.
Mr Abdullah Memon, in his letter, reminded us all that every dark
night ends in a bright morning and asked If winter comes can spring
be far behind? But, I remind him, that we are now at a stage where
philosophical clichis and pirs can no longer help us.
Corruption: continues unabated and is aided and abetted by the
higher-ups of the land. At a recent briefing of foreign Press
correspondents, the question was asked of the prime minister whether
she was aware that her country had been rated the third most corrupt
country of the world. Rather than refute the rating, the prime
minister held that some economists maintain that in developing
countries corruption is a necessary evil that provides incentives for
development. She may have picked up this idea from Joseph Nye, who
accompanied US Defence Secretary William Perry on his visit to
Pakistan. He once wrote that he thought that perhaps a little bit of
corruption in developing countries, at a very low level, helped to
push the file faster. By this, he did not mean institutionalised
corruption at the topmost level that seeps all the way down to the
bottom.
Accountability: Malik Mohammed Qasim, virtually the sole member of his
party, the PML(Q), now in the PDF coalition, who heads the grand
Federal Anti-Corruption Committee, goes after the helpless
inconsequential and pursues those out of power. Should he not start in
his own backyard, from atop his own ruling coalition, and move
downwards. He keeps on complaining that the nationalised banks and
DFIs are not cooperating with him. Does he not know who heads these
institutions, and by whom these men were hand-picked? It is obvious
that all talk of accountability is just a PR cover, a sheer pretence.
Exchange rate: When Jinnah made Pakistan, the US dollar was worth Rs
3.3. The politicians of those days had concern for the country, and
the dollar remained at this level until 1955 when a dollar could be
bought for Rs 4.76. Thereafter, because of fiscal mismanagement and
bad governance, it has cost us more and more. Since the beginning of
this fiscal year (July 1) the rupee has lost 66 paisa against the
dollar. On October 3, the SBP spot buying and selling rates were
declared to be Rs 31.62 and Rs 31.7781. There is no apparent factor
that can reassure us that the value of the rupee will not tumble
further.
Growth: There is no entertainment or sport available to the awam other
than procreation. For those with more in their pockets, there are
other limited sports, but their main entertainment, apart from
procreation, seems to be eating and watching the mini-screen, with
much consequent damage to their general health and looks. The main
growth in our country is bodies. We are listed third in world
corruption and we are listed somewhere around third in population
growth. These are our two great strengths. The government has finally
admitted that we are compounding at the rate of well over 3.5 per cent
per year. The money that is coming in from abroad for the control of
our population is not being spent for that particular purpose. Into
whose pockets is it flowing?
Education: with the population growth we have, it is impossible for
the literacy rate to even remain steady. It has to decrease, and it is
decreasing at an alarming rate. Educational standards are appalling.
Educationalist Hikmat Khaleeli related a discussion he had some months
ago with Terry Allsop, then a member of the Department of Education at
Oxford, who has made a study of the levels of education in various
countries. In Asia, our level is comparative with that in Outer
Mongolia. And in Africa, we are on a par with Ethiopia. Should Shahnaz
Wazir Ali, the prime ministers adviser on education, wish to increase
her knowledge, she can contact Allsop, who now heads the African desk
at the Overseas Development Authority in London.
The Iqra tax is variously and vigorously collected. The people,
whether they like it or not, are taxed for education and pay as and
where asked. Where does all this money go?
Health: If indeed there is a municipal health department in each city
and town, the people are certainly not aware of them. Health officers
there may be, who make money off their inspection of eating places and
retailers of foodstuffs. Take Karachi how many restaurants or
snackbars approach the laid down standards of health and hygiene? We
know of the deplorable conditions prevailing in government hospitals.
We know of the shortage of life-saving drugs. As national health
deteriorates, the demand for pharmaceutical products increases. Their
quality and prices are controlled by the corrupt of the health
ministry, the prices naturally covering the huge underhand outlays.
Remember Kazmi, health minister of the first Benazir government. Is it
true he is now living it up in Dallas?
Zakat: How much is arbitrarily deducted from the peoples bank
accounts and from their various dividends? we do not know, and neither
do we know where it all goes.
Taxes: Recently figures have been made public whereby it has been made
amply evident that those that rule over us pay the least or no taxes
at all. Much of the money collected is wasted on foreign junkets and
ego trips for our notables, and much is used to maintain their
inflated standard of living and playing. The sole point upon which the
government and opposition are not at odds is the increase in their own
salaries, allowances, and perks. A good deal is also siphoned through
the various secret accounts, the spending and skimming from which
are no secret from the enemy but only from us, the people. If the
people cannot be told how their money is spent, these accounts should
at least be listed with the names of their operators. At present, this
secret fund money is spent without any check, let alone a counter-
check.
Environment: Any man with any sense, in or out of government, can,
without fear of contradiction, hold that the first essential utility
is potable water. Are our environmentalists in search of infinity
aware of the percentage of the population that has no access to
potable water? It is no use urging those who have no drinking water to
plant and nurture trees.
Karachi: today, the most important factor. Panmunjong talks continue
between the haves and the have-nots. The suffering of the underdog has
not lessened at all. The prime minister, armed with her blunderbuss,
seems to be convinced that the problem can be shot away and lost.
Somewhat like East Pakistan?
Out of 273 days (from Jan 1 to Sep 30), Karachi remained closed for
108 days 78 weekend closure, 14 holidays, 16 strikes (two of them
government-inspired). Banks remained closed for 111 days (108 plus
three: post-budget closing, yearly closing, and strike for Usman
Ghanis slaying). The Stock Exchange was closed for 118 days (108 plus
10: four Caliphs deaths, four members deaths, Shab-e-Barat, and
Shab-e-Mairaj). The loss in GDP as a result of forced closures has
been estimated at Rs 52 billion. (Source: Business Recorder, Oct 4).
Our taxes rise, our prices rise, inflation increases. Everything we
get in return is on a continuing downslide, deteriorating in value and
in standards. How long will it be before we are declared a failed
state?
951007
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Began with a bang and ended with a whimper
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Cellular telephone technology was allowed into the country with much
fanfare, in an attempt to usher in an era of high-tech, sophisticated
telecommunications. However, July 2 1995 will forever be remembered as
the darkest day in Telecom history when in an arbitrary manner the
government thought it wise to ban the use of the pager, cellular
phones and card telephones in Karachi. This will have far reaching
consequences and is going to cost the government something that even a
billion dollars will not buy its credibility.
According to a senior executive of Paktel who spoke on conditions of
anonymity, Pakistan is not the only country in the world which has
cellular phones and is beset with problems of urban terrorism. Sri
Lanka is suffering from prolonged armed insurgency, even then the
cellular phones are functioning. Yemen was the first country to
suspend cellular phones and that was due to the civil war. Pakistan is
the second country to do so, for reasons best known to the decision
makers, as there has been no let-up in violence since the ban came
into effect on July 2 1995.
The major losers in the game have been the dealers who had heavily
invested in the industry. The nature of the investment is highly
capital intensive, and all these dealer companies had raised huge
amounts of loans.
Approximately,40 to 45 per cent of earnings generate from Karachi
alone and this ban has rendered a colossal loss to the exchequer, he
went on to add.
The combined strength of all the three cellular phones in Karachi is
approximately 25,000, rendering a loss in revenue of approximately Rs
50 million per day, by way of dues to the PTC.
The 15,000 pagers operating in Karachi alone bring in a revenue of
about Rs 1,20,000 per day to the PTC .
Taken together, the three cellular phone companies have so far
invested at least Rs 6 billion in Pakistan. Another Rs 300 million was
invested in setting up 1500 card telephones all over the city.
Karachi has always been a flagship city for any commercial activity.
Allowing them to operate in other cities does not compensate in
tangible terms to a lost out market.
When the entire world is edging towards high-tech communications it
wont be long before we have to resort to Pigeons as our mode of
sending messages. TJ.
951007
-------------------------------------------------------------------
SAP: myths and realities
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Akbar Sher Babar
RECENTLY, a number of articles have appeared reviewing the Social
Action Programme. The reviews have dealt with issues such as Value of
cost-effectiveness in service provision, user changes, public-
private partnership and sustainability of the Social Action
Programme. None can deny the value of the issues addressed in the
review.
A number of fallacies and myths are put forward by local and
expatriate experts at seminars and workshops, occasions, which only
serve the dual purpose of intellectual stimulation and some personal
profit. For example, lack of parental support to promote primary
education especially for girls is cited as one of the factors for low
female literacy rate.
Unfortunately, the analyses of these experts do not highlight the
critical factors which are the root cause of the slow pace of social
development in Pakistan. The critical factors include the
politicisation of the civil service and the strong influence of the
donors to set development priorities and strategies which may or may
not suit the local development environment.
Following are some of the symptoms of the politicisation of the civil
service that are all too apparent in the development process: * Funds
are allocated based on political rather than on professional or
community requirements; * Site selection of schemes is subject to
political interference; * Incorrect choice of technology, normally the
more expensive the choice of technology the greater the returns to the
planners and the implementers; * Lack of beneficiary involvement in
the planning and implementation of development schemes; and * Frequent
transfers of government officials resulting in complete paralysis of
line departments.
Gross misuse of the available development funds are allocated based on
the influence the politicians have at the national, provincial, or
local levels. Huge financial outlays under the MNA, MPA, and Senator
funds are used for political patronage and personal profit. Some of
these funds are distributed to preferred individuals/groups under the
pretext of small development schemes which varies in amount from Rs.
10,000 to Rs. 20,000. At the local level, simple decisions such as
setting of, schools, rural water supply schemes, and rural health
centres are based on political considerations rather than professional
or community welfare. Most of these facilities lack any staff to
operate and/or are completely devoid of any facilities essential for
utilisation of those facilities. As a consequence a number of such
facilities built for peoples welfare are used as guest houses by
local influential or to house livestock. Thus, huge investments in the
construction of primary schools, basic health units, rural health
centres, and rural water supply schemes have had little or no
beneficial impact on the target communities.
Under the present circumstance, the allocation of greater financial
resources for capital and O&M costs will only result in more pilferage
of the same without any major change in the social indicators.
In principle the collaboration between the private sector/NGOs and the
government should be encouraged wherever considered cost effective.
However, it should not be made an excuse to absolve the government of
its primary role of service delivery. Neither should private
sector/NGOs be considered an alternative to the Government in
providing such service. The NGOs natural inclination is to cater to
the urban population. There are considerable doubts about the capacity
of the NGOs to cater to the needs of the rural poor on a scale that
could result in any improvement in the poor social indicators.
Therefore, the only viable and cost effective option for social change
is a fully mobilised and committed government system in partnership
with credible NGO/private groups.
To date, the donors have made no serious attempt at the policy level
to address the issue of politicisation of the civil service and its
extremely adverse impact on service delivery.
951007
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The dynamics of revolution
-------------------------------------------------------------------
By Mazdak
It often seems that the distance from Karachis killing fields to
Defence and Clifton is the same as the long miles to Islamabad.
In both of Pakistans pockets of affluence, there is the same lack of
understanding of the dynamics of the situation in Karachi, and the
same baffled irritation at the MQM for not falling in line. As the
weekly strikes bite deep into the economy as well as the nerves and
pockets of rich and poor Karachiites alike, a weary nation silently
cries Enough! But the government is clearly playing a waiting game,
trying to lock up or kill enough hard-core members of the ethnic party
to make it reduce its long list of demands before signing an
agreement.
The MQM, for its part, is determined to keep the city on edge through
its weekly strikes and hit-and-run tactics. We, the blood-spattered
audience and victims, want them both to stop the fight and accept a
draw, but in the absence of a referee, the fighters continue to slug
it out.
The government, sitting comfortably and safely in Islamabad, or
whizzing past with armed escorts in Karachi, can afford the luxury of
wearing the MQM down. Its biggest concern is not with the lives or the
livelihood of individual victims, but with declining revenues and
cancelled MOUs. As long as the macro- economic indicators are within
acceptable limits, the government feels it has enough time to stall.
The MQM, for its part, has very little to lose because it can force
the city to come to a standstill once a week through the fear it has
spread. In fact, people are coming to terms with weekly strikes.
What is at the root of this implacable determination? What prompts the
Mohajirs of Sindh to vote for the MQM time and again? Arif Hasan, in a
long and perceptive article in the September issue of the monthly
Herald, has gone to the heart of the matter. Mr Hasan is ideally
qualified for analysing the situation, According to him, what we are
witnessing in Karachi today is a major conflict between the evolving
urban capitalist culture of the city and its development plus
operations and maintenance requirements on the one hand, and the
nature of the Pakistan state and the system of patronage, nepotism,
adhocism, corruption, parochialism and exploitation that are integral
to it, on the other hand.
This may be a long and involved sentence, but it underlines the
essence of the deadlock: the state is unwilling to countenance the
emergence of a system based on merit and competition the core of the
urban, capitalist culture because it would cut across, and
ultimately replace, the network of relatives and cronies who support
and sustain the present dispensation. To substantiate his argument, Mr
Hasan has given details of the all-pervasive system of extortion,
bribery and sifarish on which virtually all business transactions in
the city are based where the vast public sector is concerned. No
beggar, no street seller and no small businessman can operate without
paying off the cops. Nobody can supply goods and services to the
provincial or federal government in Karachi without bribing a
succession of officials and politicians and their touts. No young
graduate can hope to get a government job without sifarish or a bribe.
Usually, both are needed. Whether it is credit from the House Building
Finance Corporation to build a house, or an electricity connection
>from KESC, nothing moves without a bribe. And the situation is worse
in the katchi abadis where the poorest of the poor live.
So why should these well-known, deeply-entrenched problems give rise
to the quasi-civil war that is taking place in Karachi? Mr Hasan
reminds us that this inability to compete on merit and exercise ones
entrepreneurial skills have been responsible for many bourgeois
revolutions in nineteenth and early twentieth century Europe. In
Karachi, these economic and social forces have been given an ethnic
edge by the historical coincidence that concentrated Indian Muslims
and their descendants here in such large numbers. Mr Hasan ascribes
the large MQM vote bank in Karachi to the middle class leadership of
the party which is in sharp contrast to the feudal nature of other
mainstream parties, as a result of which they do not address the
problems of the working classes. The second reason is that in the
absence of an institutional framework that protects the poor from
exploitation, they group together to forge ethnic bonds as a way to
protect themselves from the state and its predatory agents.
The Karachi situation is part of the larger crisis looming across the
Pakistani horizon. With the consolidation of capitalist farming,
urbanisation and increased literacy, the old pattern of inter-class
relations has changed. Ethnic groups and communities to whom history
had assigned specific roles are now competing with communities and
groups that were more advanced than them. In the absence of
appropriate institutional arrangements to deal with this situation,
the old institutions have become irrelevant and ineffective, and hence
corrupt...
951008
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Ordeal of ID cards
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Column
COMPLAINTS have been mounting about the hassles involved in securing
national identity cards. While the rightful seekers of ID cards find
it extremely difficult to obtain them, there are hosts of unauthorised
people in possession of genuine or fake cards. Since 1973 when this
scheme was introduced in the country, corruption made deep inroads
into the different layers of the organisational set-up.
Initially, the application forms were meant to be freely available;
now they are not. Touts and agents supply them at a price depending on
the urgency of need or the financial capacity of the applicants. The
forms are to be submitted at designated registration offices. In most
cases, because of a huge rush, applicants fail to reach the windows
meant for receiving applications. If they somehow manage to submit
their forms, often they are not issued a proper receipt. Instead, they
are asked to present themselves at the same counter after about a week
to be told whether or not their forms are in order. Even at that stage
they are confronted with many real or imaginary objections. In sheer
desperation, they eventually seek the assistance of agents who hang
around registration offices and flourish on the miseries of the
helpless ID card seekers.
The national identity card scheme was launched primarily with two
objectives: to ensure accuracy of census and to check the influx of
illegal immigrants. Neither has been achieved. Many ID cards are
issued without proper verification.
According to a report, in Karachi alone over ten million ID cards have
so far been issued although the number of eligible nationals is much
less. As ID card is the basic document for identification of an
individual and for the exercise of his rights as a bona fide national,
many unauthorised persons have obtained it through questionable means.
Besides identification, the card is needed for enrolment on voters
lists, recruitment in government, semi-government and private
services, elimination of fake witnesses in courts, obtaining passports
or any other national documents, getting admission in educational
institutions and making any business deal. It is ironical that while
obtaining an ID card has become an ordeal for genuine citizens, an
estimated three million non-nationals are believed to be in illegal
possession of it.
Most problems associated with the issuance of the ID card emanate from
administrative and procedural weaknesses. In the beginning,
registration offices all over the country were set up district-wise.
But this arrangement has proved totally inadequate. Police
verification of individual cases must also be made an expeditious
process. To make these measures workable, efficient organisational
set-up will be required. Only then can securing the ID card be made a
reasonably painless process.

951009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The PPP in Punjab: staving off the inevitable
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Ayaz Amir
WHETHER the PPP has its own chief minister presiding over the
corruption-ridden politics of Punjab, a possibility mercifully
averted, or whether it appoints another senior minister with
plenipotentiary powers, Punjab is a lost cause for it. That is the
writing on the wall and if Ms Bhutto of the regal and blithe manner
chooses to ignore it so much the worse for the future of her party.
It is not even fair to say that the PPP lost Punjab in 1993 or 1988
for that matter. Paradoxically, the partys decline in the powerhouse
of Pakistani politics began on the day Ms Bhutto, after capping the
period of her self-imposed exile, arrived in Lahore on the morning of
April 10, 1986. The ecstatic welcome she received on that occasion
almost lent substance to the impression that all of Punjab lay at her
feet.
But by moving systematically from the left to the centre and then even
further to the right and by picking flunkies and hangers-on to head
the partys affairs in the province she set in motion that chain of
events which has seen a drastic loss of support for the party at the
grass-roots level. It still has a vote bank but over the years this
has shrunken in size to the point that today, if one is to go by the
evidence of ones senses, it is significantly smaller than that of the
PML(N).
Anyone inclined to dispute this judgement should take time out to
visit the Punjab countryside. The opprobrium which the present PPP
government has managed to accumulate for itself, whether because of
its record or the tales of high corruption surrounding its leaders,
will come as a great eye-opener.
Nawaz Sharif was not a particularly successful prime minister either
but this much can be said for him that because of some of his
development plans he had come to be seen in the public eye as a man of
action, as someone who wanted to do something for the country. Most of
those schemes might not stand up to critical scrutiny but they served
their purpose by influencing the current of public opinion.
Ms Bhutto, on the other hand, cannot claim credit for a single policy
or development scheme which could win public approval for her. On the
contrary, she is held directly responsible for the inflation and
maladministration now holding the country in their thrill.
There is a misconception about political patronage which has acquired
wide currency and which lies behind much of the manoeuvring which the
nation has recently witnessed in Punjab. It consists of the belief
that the doling out of patronage can win popular support. The evidence
of Pakistani history should belie this judgement because the people
time and again, whether in the Ayub era or subsequently, have
responded not to the blandishments of pork but to appeals addressed to
their inner-most feelings.
This is how Bhutto and Mujib rode the crest of popular sympathy in
1970. Even if it be thought that the era of charismatic politics in
Pakistan is over it is still instructive to bear in mind that Nawaz
Sharifs present popularity owes little to the fact that he held the
purse-strings of Punjab in his hands during the period of his chief
ministership. It stems more from the way he defied Ghulam Ishaq Khan
in 1993.
Or consider Wattoos case. A prince of patronage before his fall.
Practically a nonentity now. Which does not mean that patronage is of
no account in politics. Only this that it can never be a substitute
for popular policies. In order to believe in a leader the people must
feel that he or she belongs to them.
It is Ms Bhuttos singular accomplishment that despite the legacy of
her father, who blazed new trails in popular politics, she has removed
herself from the pale of public sympathy. Five years ago who could
have thought that Nawaz Sharif, rising to political prominence from
the bosom of a military dictatorship, could ever take her place?
Today, however, if there is a popular leader in Punjab it is not
Zulfikar Ali Bhuttos daughter but, come to think of it, Mian Mohammad
Sharifs son. No amount of patronage doled out in Punjab is going to
alter this fact, at least not till the next elections.
But then how are we to account, the sceptically-inclined might ask,
for Benazirs second coming as prime minister? After all, defying past
trends, she is the only leader in Pakistan to have staged a comeback.
An explanation for this phenomenon must be sought in her stars and the
ill-luck of her predecessor who invited tragedy for himself by picking
an unnecessary quarrel with his protector, the then President Ghulam
Ishaq Khan.
This explanation, admittedly, is a thin one because what counts in
politics, as indeed in life, is success and not how one comes by it.
Still, to the extent that it indicates that Ms Bhuttos second
ascension to power has little to do with any rise in her popularity,
it remains relevant to the predicament her party faces in Punjab.
To go over the reasons for the precipitous decline in the PPPs Punjab
fortunes amounts to beating a dead horse. Not only are these reasons
well known to the initiated. They are engraved in iron on the souls of
the partys disaffected workers whose eyes were set on the promised
land when Benazir returned to Pakistan in 1986. Suffice it to say that
the PPPs fate was sealed when a second-ranking carpetbagger like
Jehangir Badr was appointed to run its affairs in Punjab. If anything
could have taken that process further it was the Lady Nahid Khans
apotheosis as virtual boss of the provincial party during Benazirs
second prime ministership. It would be silly to deny that Nahid has
her qualities and uses but to make her the virtual keeper of the
partys keys is a blow not so much to its dispirited battalions as to
the memory of the partys founder. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto may have
deserved many things but not this.
Into what precise events the partys decline is translated in the
future remains to be seen because predicting the course of Pakistani
politics is a hazardous business. There has never been an orderly or
strictly constitutional transfer of power in Pakistan before and,
given the state of our democracy, it is tempting the fates to say that
there will be one when the term of the present government draws to a
close. Even so, what we are seeing is a watershed of sorts with a
political party which has left its mark on Pakistani politics losing
its mass appeal through a natural process and being replaced in the
popular mind by a rejuvenated Muslim League. Come the next elections
and this transformation should change the political landscape of
Pakistan provided no miracles intervene.
In this analysis (if it can be dignified by that name there are no
lessons for the PPP because the PPP of Asif Ali Zardari and the Lady
Nahid are beyond correcting and improving. Nothing can swerve it from
the self-defeating course it is set on. But there are lessons for the
PML(N) which would do both itself and the people of the country a
favour if it forswore the tactics of empty agitation (such as the
Tehrik-i-Nijat last year which exposed its hollow threats) and set its
eyes instead on preparing for the next elections. For unruly
politicians intent on reaping quick harvests this is probably a tall
order. But waiting for the next elections is not only a requirement of
our erratic and fragile democracy. It is also a dictate of necessity.
Through its ill-conceived campaign last year the PML(N) tried its best
to force the issue but as even a half-informed observer might have
warned it, its bringing-the-government-down movement fizzled out
leading to exhaustion and demoralisation in its ranks and a feeling of
triumph on the part of the government. If nothing else this proves
that as with the PPP the level of everyday discernment in the PML(N)
is also quite low.
The real problem before the country, however, is not who wins power in
Punjab but how this power is used to modernise the archaic structure
of the Pakistani state. In the latest issue of the monthly Herald,
Arif Hasan perceptively points out that the aspirations of the lower
middle and working classes are increasingly in conflict with the
nature of the Pakistani state and its hallmarks of patronage,
nepotism, adhocism, corruption, parochialism and exploitation. What to
talk of the will to settle this conflict, the PPP has not even the
barest understanding of it. Can the PML(N), the alternative on the
national stage, do any better? That, and not just the acquisition of
power, is the true challenge facing its leadership.
951010
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Not a clean bill of health
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Column
CONCERN has rightly been expressed by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP)
over the intensification of inflationary pressure during the last
fiscal year. What is more worrying is the feet that it shows no signs
of
abating. The year 1994-95 to which the State Bank's Annual Report,
released on Sunday, relates was a year of failure in achieving most of
the key sector targets although the economy did register improvements
in many areas. However, the, most depressing aspect remains the rising
prices. The Report records anxiety over the failure to reduce the rate
of action to the targeted 7%. Instead, the consumer price index (CPI)
registered an increase of 12.9% which was perhaps the highest increase
in Pakistan's history. This country has always experienced moderate
inflation. The present trend of high inflation rate started in 1990-91
when the CPI touched 12.7% mark and since then has refused to relent.
Analysing, the causative factors, the State Bank has blamed low
economic growth, large budgetary deficit, high monetary expansion and
increases in administered prices of food items and in charges of
utilities for
the intensification of inflationary pressure. The government failed to
reduce the deficit - the main cause of inflation - to the targeted
level of 4% of the GDP, although it may be said to its credit that it
succeeded in bringing it down from 8%, which it had inherited in 1993,
to 5.5% last year. The continuing wide gap between resources and
expenditure made it necessary for the government to have resort to the
banking system for budgetary support far in excess of the original
target of Rs 15 billion.
Throughout the year the governments borrowing remained higher than
the previous year's total borrowing of Rs 19 billion. Apart from bank
borrowing, the deficit was also covered by the utilisation of a part
of the privatisation proceeds. These actions contributed to the
monetary expansion which was further strengthened by borrowing by
public sector corporations and a substantial increase in lending by
the Agricultural Development Bank and the Small Business Corporation
under the government-sponsored credit schemes.
Major failure occurred in revenue collection which registered a
shortfall of Rs 39 billion. Pakistan has never had a proper tax
culture. It inherited from the colonial rulers a state which was
looked upon as oppressive and not at all interested in the welfare of
the people. Unfortunately, this perception of the state being
oppressive and
indifferent to public welfare still persists despite the lapse of half
a century. In recent years the alienation has been further accentuated
by acute maldistribution of income due to pervasive corruption and
inequitable incidence of taxes.
Not only that those who legislate taxes exempt major sources of their
own income; they do not even care to pay whatever little they are
liable to pay. In such an environment the rulers lack the necessary
moral
strength to enforce fulfilment of tax obligations. Unless all incomes,
including agricultural incomes, are brought within the tax net and
privileges are eliminated, budget deficit will continue to stay at an
unacceptable level. What is more, there is no visible reduction in
government's lavish and ostentatious spending. These factors led to
the failure in raising the contribution of taxes to the contemplated
20% of the GDP. The enlarged budget deficit had to be met from
domestic and foreign borrowings. Such borrowings over the last many
years have landed Pakistan into a debt-trap where it has to borrow to
service old loans. The total national debt, as of June 30 last, stood
at Rs 1,556.6 billion - Rs 796.8 billion being domestic - and
constituted 83.3% of the GDP. The servicing of this huge debt is
inconsistent with the existing
revenue generation scope of the state. The State Bank has, therefore,
strongly advocated the enlargement of the coverage of income and
consumption taxes. In order to contain the effect of these taxes on
inflation, production needs to be exempted or taxed lightly and
selectively, while consumption has to be taxed widely but at low
rates. All taxes must be collected efficiently and unsparingly. High
increases in utility charges and prices of food items and petroleum
products have contributed heavily to inflation.
Notwithstanding the internal financial imbalances, the balance of
payments improved during the year under review on account of increases
in exports by about 18% against previous year's negative 1.4% and in
expatriates remittances by 20%. Deregulation of investment and
liberalisation of exchange controls created a favourable environment
for foreign - investment which increased by more than 100% to $1.53
billion. Imports also increased by almost the same ratio as exports.
The welcome aspect of imports has been a greater inflow of capital
goods mainly because of the current emphasis on power generation and
encouragement of export-oriented and technology-packed industries. The
disconcerting aspect, however, is the decline in domestic savings.
This decline is largely due to substantial dissaving in the public
sector, mainly because of the budget deficit. This deficit has to be
controlled if development is to be sustained and inflation brought
under control.
951007
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Corruption at the top
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Column
THE federal commerce minister's appeal to the people to help eradicate
corruption is not the first time a public leader has harped on this
theme. The widespread prevalence of corruption in Pakistan and the
need for rooting it out are favourite topics of discussion, especially
among the higher echelons of leadership. Chaudhri Ahmad Mukhtar has
taken the plea that the government cannot deal with this menace
single-handedly. He has placed the onus of bringing honest leaders
into office on the public. With Pakistan having been assessed as being
one of the most corrupt countries in the world by the Berlin based
Transparency International, one would fault Ahmad Mukhtar's concern on
this score. One can, however, well ask him why the government of which
the honourable minister is a member cant do something about the
corrupt practices of its own high functionaries.
The facts is that broadly streaking, the corruption one sees in public
life is of two kinds. One is that practised by the administration in
the course of performing its duties. At times the gratification an
official
seeks is in essence a glorified tip which he demands almost as a
matter of right for doing a certain job promptly and efficiently. The
bureaucrats are also known for bending the laws for monetary gains,
political favours and nepotism. The other corruption is the one in
which the political leaders indulge to amass a fortune while they are
in a position to do so. Obviously, the members of a ruling party,
especially holding an office of importance, have greater
opportunities for featherbedding. What needs to be emphasised is that
the corruption of the political leaders is the bigger of the two evils
because it sets the tone and pace for the lower functionaries. A
corrupt leader has no moral standing to check the wrong doings of his
subordinates. On the contrary, he has perforce to give protection to
the corrupt in his department to save his own skin.
With corruption flowing from top downwards, it is at that level that
any move to contain the spreading scourge must begin. Given the
exorbitant amounts politicians are required to spend on their
elections, it is not quite surprising (though not justifiable) that
many of them want to make most of their opportunities for self-
gratification while the sun shines on their political fortunes. It is
plain that the rule imposing a ceiling of one million rupees on the
election expenses of an MNA is flouted blatantly. With politics turned
into of a money game in Pakistan; corruption has emerged as an
integral part of the post-election scenario. The compulsion for an
elected leader to make money can be somewhat eased if the election
rules are changed and the money factor in politics ceases to be a
prime determinant.
There is also the need to strengthen the mechanisms for weeding out
corruption. Some institutions already exist for this purpose. These
include the Federal Anti-Corruption Committee and the ombudsman. They
need to be activated further to make them effective against corruption
among politicians and in government. The government should also take
the initiative to set up a body comprising honest and public-spirited
non-government figures to expose corruption and generate pressure for
its eradication. The media can also play an important role in this
context. But without a public agency of the kinds suggested above, the
newspapers often find themselves exposed to pressures and intimidation
by the tainted among the rulers and their minions. Since there are
members of the government who have started stressing the need for
crusading against corruption, one can hope that they will not hesitate
to act to prevent and control it. Even if it means risking the wrath
of the powerful in doing so, one hopes that the few honest politicians
who are still around will act to bring some decency and propriety to
politics.
951006
-------------------------------------------------------------------
If only they would see reason
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Editorial Column
CONSIDER or perhaps weigh the following nuggets of news and you will
get an idea of the sum total of doom being employed to come to grips
with the problem of Karachi. Shazia Farooq, wife of the late Farooq
Dada, is released after being kept in custody from the time her
husband died. The confiscated passport of Sheikh Liaquat Hussain, a
member of MQM negotiating team, is to be returned to him. The police
will again
provide protection to the MQM negotiating team. These are some of the
steps the government is taking in order to facilitate the resumption
of the stalled talks with the MQM. The magnitude of these steps may
bring
a wry look on the face of the bemused observer but then in a hopeless
situation it is churlish not to be grateful for small mercies.
All the pleas made by the national Press for a greater element of
seriousness and sincerity to enter the talks between the government
and the MQM have fallen largely on deaf ears. The way the talks have
progressed so far (if progress indeed is the right word to use in the
circumstances) is reminiscent of the talks that used to be held at the
height of the cold war between North and South Korea along their
common
border. After reading lengthy wooden statements the two sides would
disperse to meet again. Everyone concerned speaks solemnly and even
pretentously about the Karachi situation but little of these feelings
permeate the negotiations being conducted (and then broken off) by
both sides. Professional casuists would no doubt be thrilled by the
passion for hair-splitting on ample display in these talks but not
anyone
concerned about the unrest and violence playing havoc with Karachi.
There is, of course, no shortage around of pious intentions. When
President Farooq Leghari was in Karachi earlier this week, he said
things which would find a ready echo in the hearts of most
Karachiites. Stressing the need for a genuine and meaningful dialogue
to resolve the problems of Karachi, he expressed concern about the
high-handedness that often takes place when the police and the Rangers
lay siege to entire localities and make indiscriminate arrests. Such
practices, he said, would prove counter-productive and would alienate
the people because any anti-terrorist strategy must lie within the
ambit of the rule of law. These are sensible and wise words but to
listen to them on one side and then to see the reality of Karachi on
the other makes us wonder whether there is any communication between
the various organs of the state.
General Babar may have brought a fierce single-mindedness to the fight
against violence in Karachi but it is a moot point whether he is at
all capable of realising the extent of the resentment being caused in
that city as a result of the excesses often committed by the law
enforcement agencies. Breaking the law in order to uphold the majesty
of the law is one contradiction in terms that we would do well to
avoid. At the same time, the MQM must cast an eye over its chosen
tactics to put pressure on the government. Not only that Karachi has
had enough of strikes and the disruptions and losses that they entail,
and could do without them in the future. The frequent resort to them,
>from the standpoint of practicality, dilutes their efficaciousness.
The MQM speaks for the majority of the population of Karachi. There is
no need to prove this point every other day. But then both sides,
sadly are set on parallel courses. If only at some point (through a
miracle we have yet to know anything about) their disparate paths
could converge.
950911
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Attack on Sindh Secretariat
-------------------------------------------------------------------
ALTHOUGH Karachi has lived with violence for a long time, there are
certain designated areas of the city, where most of this violence has
been regularly played out. The precision rocket attacks at the very
heart of the Sindh government break this complacent pattern and cast
wry light on the claims of various government stalwarts, not least
among them the redoubtable General Babar, that the back of terrorism
(an increasingly fashionable phrase these days) has been broken.
In a manner to vivid for comfort, the rockets fired at the Sindh
Secretariat bring home the harsh reality with which Karachi has been
struggling for the last so many years. It is no small cause for
thanksgiving that the damage has not been greater than it is or that
no lives were lost in what easily could have-turned into a wider
catastrophe.
But these considerations apart, this attack, its dramatic impact on
the public imagination not withstanding, is no more serious or heinous
than the daily killings which take place in the troubled parts of
Karachi.
Consequently, it is not the firing of the rockets themselves that
should be the major object of our concern. Concern should rather be
centred on the fact that urban terrorism has dug deep roots in the
country's largest city. As long as this tragic phenomenon persists and
as long as innocent people get killed (to the extent that if only five
people are gunned down in Karachi on any given day instead of a dozen
it is considered a sign of normality) there is no saying what ugly or
still more dramatic forms this terrorism will take.
Nor do these rockets alter the importance of what we on our part or
concerned citizens on theirs have been saying all along: that it is
not by the use of palliatives or the thunder of empty words that the
gathering mayhem in Karachi can be contained but by the exercise of
political will of the most serious kind at the highest levels of
government. What is happening in Karachi, or rather to Karachi, is
central to the well-being of the country. If this realisation does not
sink in or, in other words, if we remain bereft of vision as all the
current signs indicate we are, then all we can look forward to is more
hair-splitting and more time-wasting along the lines of what the
nation has been treated to during the course of the talks between the
government and the MQM.
Who is behind the rocket attacks is an important question but one
whose importance must be kept in perspective. When a fire is raging
there is not much point in blaming this or that piece of incendiary
material
for the conflagration. The problem in Karachi today is to strike at
the roots of its distress, not just attack the symptoms. In this
connection it is worth pointing out that General Babar is doing a
soldier's duty in Karachi.
In the prevailing lawlessness of the city this is perhaps a necessary
function to perform. But it is scarcely enough. To the distress of
Karachi must also be applied the balm of statesmanship, something that
we find woefully lacking in the ongoing tragedy of this once peaceful
city.
951012
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Danger alert by State Bank
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Sultan Ahmed
WITH its history of dominance in too many areas, the government could
not have liked the State Banks disapproval of its fiscal and monetary
policies, and the underscoring of a critical situation the nation
could face unless urgent remedial measures were taken.
Had the situation been not so bad, the Banks board of directors,
which consists mostly of officials like finance secretary or retired
senior officials would not have adopted this kind of annual report. In
fact what the report says is the same that the IMF, World Bank, donor
states and sane economists at home have all along been putting their
finger on.
Of course, the Benazir government could not be blamed exclusively for
the parlous state of the economy with many seemingly unsolvable
problems. Many of them are legacies of previous regimes, but have
definitely aggravated during the present governments tenure
particularly after the ill-advised over-taxation it resorted to last
year. It failed in it and fell out with the IMF which stopped payment
of further tranches of the 1.5 billion dollar aid stretched over three
years under its Extended Structural Adjustment facility.
Surely, problems like the large budget deficit, sustained heavy
official borrowing, staggering national debt which has mounted to Rs
1,554.6 billion now, and large bank loan defaults are the result of
the overhang of many years as the State Bank likes to describe it in
its Annual Report for 1994-95. The situation is so bad that even the
much-dreaded public disclosure of the names of the defaulters has not
resulted in the recovery of more than 15 per cent of the loans two
years after the lists were out.
The report says that despite the impact of inflation, the people have
done far better than the government. Private savings rose from 13.1
per cent of the GDP to 13.9 per cent but public savings dropped from
2.6 per cent to 0.9 per cent. As a result, national savings came down
>from 15.7 per cent to 14.8 per cent, marking area increase of just 1.8
per cent if adjusted for 13 per cent inflation.
Home remittances by overseas Pakistanis rose to 1,866 million dollars
>from 1,446 million dollars in 1993-94. Pakistanis have kept around
four billion dollars in the foreign exchange accounts in our banks,
enabling the government to claim a large foreign exchange reserve,
contrary to the practice of many countries not to treat short-term
deposits as the nations reserve.
The SBP wants the government to reduce the budget deficit by
increasing the real revenues and not by printing more currency notes,
as has been done for many years. It wants broad-based taxation, which
should include the large incomes from agriculture. While the
government is agreeable to that in principle, it is not ready to move
firmly in that direction and the Constitution helps the farmlords to
avoid taxes.
What we have is a highly tangled taxation structure, made far worse by
corruption of a high level, and the sustained inflation and steady
devaluation makes investment even more expensive. The SBP also wants
the government to cut its non-productive and wasteful expenditure, and
stresses that bank borrowing for its current consumption is even more
inflationary than if that is spent on development.
It is not that inflation, large budget deficits and unrestrained
printing of money hurt only the public; its hurts the government as
well when it is forced to raise the wages of its employees
substantially, and levy additional taxation to pay the higher wage
bill which causes public protests.
The SBP report says, the government is also using the proceeds of
privatisation to meet its expenditure. Hence instead of using that
fund to lower the pyramiding national debt it will use Rs 12 billion
>from that for the Social Action Programme after it had used Rs 11
billion last year and Rs 2 billion the year before. And it depends on
foreign and domestic loans for funding the Annual development
Programme.

===================================================================
951012
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Pakistan team in high spirits for today's tie
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Special Representative
SHARJAH, Oct 11: Pakistans hopes of regaining the title they last won
in 1989 received a setback when speed merchant Wasim Akram was ruled
out of competition because of `frozen shoulder.
Paceman Ataur Rahman, who was named in the stand-byes, has been
selected as Akrams replacement and he is scheduled to arrive late
Wednesday evening.
Mushtaq mentioned, the decision has been taken with a view of the
tough tour Down Under. Had Akram aggravated the injury, he would have
been unable to tour Australia and New Zealand. We can afford to play
without him here but not in Australia.
Akram last played for Pakistan in the second Test against Sri Lanka at
Faisalabad. In that Test, the allrounder sustained the unique injury
which forced him to pull out of the third Test at Sialkot as well as
the one-day series.
Mushtaq, asked to comment on tomorrows game, said it was crucial in
terms of regaining the shattered confidence. The players are
determined to do well but in one-day cricket you just cant predict.
The former Pakistan captain added that all the players were in fine
physical condition.
While saying that the playing eleven will be announced shortly before
the start of the match, Mushtaq added the team will be a combination
of five batsmen, five bowlers and a wicketkeeper.
There are indications that Basit Ali will sit out and Saeed Anwar will
bat at No 5. Aamir Sohail and Salim Elahi will open the innings and
Ramiz Raja and Inzamamul Haq will bat at No 3 and 4 respectively.
Leg-spinner Mushtaq Ahmad is also expected to miss the match. Saqlain
Mushtaq, Waqar Younis, Mohammad Akram, Aqib Javed and Zafar Iqbal will
form the bowling combination.
Meanwhile, Sri Lankan opener Roshan Mahanama will also sit out from
Thursdays match after he sustained, what the management think, groin
injury. His place is likely to be taken by Chandika Hathurusinghe who
had a successful tour of Pakistan in which he scored 291 runs with the
bat. He, however, did not play in the one-day series.
The two teams will be selected from:
SRI LANKA: Sanath Jayasuriya, Chandika Hathurusinghe, Asanka
Gurusinha, Aravinda de Silva, Arjuna Ranatunga (captain), Hashan
Tillekeratne, Rumesh Kaluwitharna, Rawan Kalpage, Muttiah
Muralitharan, Pramodiya Wickremasinghe, Kumar Dharmasena, Eric
Upashanta, Wendell Labrooy, Roshan Mahanama.
PAKISTAN: Aamir Sohail, Salim Elahi, Ramiz Raja (captain), Inzamamul
Haq, Saeed Anwar, Moin Khan, Zafar Iqbal, Waqar Younis, Saqlain
Mushtaq, Aqib Javed, Mohammad Akram, Mushtaq Ahmad, Basit Ali and
Ataur Rahman.